Talk:Illustrating Tolkien

Illustrating Tolkien has been listed as one of the Art and architecture good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it. Review: April 4, 2024. (Reviewed version).

This article is rated GA-class on Wikipedia's Guide to writing better articles that generally fictional articles should be written in present tense, all Tolkien legendarium-related articles that cover in-universe material before the current action must be written in past tense. Please see Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards for more information about this and other article standards.

@Chiswick Chap: I appreciate all the work you've done here. However, this article now has 19 non-free images on it, making it the 4th highest user of non-free images on the entire project. That's an exceptionally high number of non-free images. Exceptional use needs exceptional justification. Please trim down the number of non-free images. Thank you, --Hammersoft (talk) 02:31, 16 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks. I've trimmed the non-free images down to 11, which I believe to be the fewest possible while preserving the basic sense of the article. Given that this article is explicitly visual in its purpose, illustrating Tolkien, and given that it discusses many different artists' ways of looking at Tolkien's work, it cannot be written without actually showing a diversity of illustrations. Removing any more images would seriously damage the article as readers would wonder why it was talking about specific artists and images without illustrating them. Accordingly, I believe that the remaining images are both individually and collectively necessary and minimal for the purpose of providing encyclopedic coverage of the topic. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:39, 16 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for doing this! There are many people who resist such input and won't trim. You're one of the few who have. I'll take a look at the remaining 11 when I have some time just to see if an outside set of eyes can make sense of it with 11, or needs more or less. --Hammersoft (talk) 20:19, 16 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

, to believe that this article is an "image gallery", a set of images clumped together in a table, list, or gallery tag as a decorative visual display or collection.

I note that you quote

WP:NFG

(aka NFTABLE), which says: The use of non-free images arranged in a gallery or tabular format is usually unacceptable, but should be considered on a case-by-case basis. Exceptions should be very well-justified and alternate forms of presentation (including with fewer images) strongly considered.

• Firstly, Illustrating Tolkien does not contain "non-free images arranged in a gallery or tabular format": it does not consist of a "gallery", whether using a gallery template, a gallery tag structure, or a handmade gallery using a table.

• Secondly, the article contains no decorative or redundant images (free or otherwise). Editors may like to note that an image (free or not) which is the main subject of discussion in a section is centred underneath the text which discusses it; supplementary free images are aligned to the right, to indicate they are off to the side of the main discussion.

• Thirdly, even if (which I do not believe) there was a gallery here, I note that WP:NFG actually permits galleries "on a case-by-case basis" as long as they are "well-justified". Illustrating Tolkien does not in my view consist of or contain a gallery in any form, but each image is indeed "very well-justified" in three ways: 1) each one is linked to or called out in the cited text; 2) each one's relevance and purpose is explained in a cited caption; and 3) each one is fully justified in its NFUR. For the avoidance of doubt, I have expanded and focused the rationale in the NFUR for each non-free image.

• Fourthly, as can be seen in the thread above, a determined effort has already been made to use "alternate forms of presentation (including with fewer images)". Text has been used as far as possible; free images have been supplied where they can carry some of the weight of the article; and the number of images has been cut down to the bare minimum, even at the price of reducing the comprehensibility of some sections of the text.

I note that you also quote

which calls out the Non-Free Rationale system.

• Each non-free image used in the article has a full NFUR template completed. I'm very happy to add more detail to any of these; what I can say directly is that each image has a distinct rationale appropriate to its context, and that each one both supports and is supported by the cited and scholarly or critical text that discusses it. In other words, the images are fully-woven into the fabric of the article, which could not really exist without them: 'Illustrating Tolkien' without illustrations would be somewhat strange, to put it mildly.

This article is however nothing remotely like an image gallery: it is a full Wikipedia text article (10 primary and 68 secondary references, citing 15 major published sources). The article covers the nature of Tolkien's own artwork. It then examines his complex views on illustration, cited to multiple scholarly sources with its themes analysed further in a table, the whole chapter containing just one non-free image (Cor Blok).

The chapter 'In dialogue with Tolkien' necessarily involves different artists, who at different times engaged in discussions with Tolkien about illustrating his work. Each artist gets a separate section with detailed analysis cited to scholarly and artistic sources, explaining the nature of Tolkien's interest in their work. In the case of 'Mary Fairburn, 1968', for instance, there are two paragraphs of discussion, quoting Tolkien's opinion of Fairburn's artwork, and detailing the history; the section is supported by a single example of her artwork, which in turn is supported by a full Non-Free Use Rationale on the image's page, giving readers the bare minimum of a look at what may have attracted Tolkien to her work. This is certainly an encyclopedic use of an image.

The next chapter, 'Independent views', examines artists from around the world, including

artist (Šalamoun). Again, each approach is analysed with scholarly discussion and sources. In no case is the work of an artist shown with more than one non-free image. Two artists who have released their images to Commons under CC-by-SA licenses are illustrated in more detail, allowing readers to get an insight into the range of themes they treated. The other artists discussed are either unillustrated or have their work shown in a single image, the bare minimum to enable readers unfamiliar with their work to understand its merits. None of the images are used decoratively; in every case they directly support the scholarly and reliably-cited history and analysis.

The last chapter, on the effect of Peter Jackson's films, briefly discusses a major topic with multiple sources, giving just one non-free illustration, that of the German illustrator Anke Eißmann who set out as a fan and has become a well-known professional artist. Again, this is nothing remotely like an image gallery.

I think that any editor who reads the article will see that it is a serious piece of encyclopedia writing based on detailed study of the scholarly and artistic sources available. Each of the images used has been carefully selected for its encyclopedic value in the context of the cited text that discusses it; none of them are decorative or redundant. Further, I suggest that it will be obvious to any open-minded editor that the text of the article could not stand alone without the supporting images; each one is plainly part of the fabric of the article, which would be broken and incomprehensible without illustration. I value my writing skills, but when discussing artworks, a picture is not just "worth a thousand words", but actually invaluable. If it were possible to give a visual impression with all the emotional force of a painting or drawing, then artists would presumably not bother to create artworks: at least, their efforts would be redundant to the superior or equivalently-valued texts. But of course, no such text can be created, which is why we use appropriately licensed images, free or non-free, in Wikipedia.

Pinging Hammersoft per interest from thread above. Chiswick Chap (talk) 11:38, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Where can I read JJMC89’s comments that sparked this explanation? Strebe (talk) 18:01, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Strebe: Good question. There weren't any, beyond the placing of deletion tags and possibly-automated edit comments in the article history citing the guidelines I've mentioned above: I've linked the edits at the top of this thread for you. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:30, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]