Manfred Escher

Manfred Escher, Pegasus Press art director and illustrator

Manfred Escher: Art Director, Designer, and Illustrator for Pegasus Spiele GmbH from 2001-2011.

Biography

Manfred Escher first encountered Lovecraftian horror in 1990 the form of German and English language Cthulhu RPG games and fiction in a popular Munich RPG shop, beginning with the 1986 German-language Cthulhu RPG Auf Cthulhus Spur. The alien Lovecraftian names and marked darkness in tone and mood compared the more typical Tolkienesque sword-and-sorcery fantasy fiction and RPGs popular at the time sparked Escher's creative imagination and fascination with Lovecraft's fiction and the Call of Cthulhu RPG, helping Escher to encourage his friends to try the game, and spreading its popularity in Germany. To help spread the word and organize interest in Cthulhu gaming, Escher established a web presence as an art designer through his short-lived website www.nyarlathotep.de from 1999, where Pegasus Spiele GmbH Editor-in-Chief Frank Heller discovered the artist, contacted him, and introduced him to Pegasus Spiele in 2001, where Escher contributed to numerous product cover illustrations and internal artwork; anyone who saw a German-language Cthulhu book in the store in the 2000s and beyond, probably looked at an cover illustration by Manfred Escher of Munich, Germany. Beginning in 2001, the freelance media designer and art director significantly influenced the visual appearance of Pegasus Spiele German Cthulhu-inspired horror role-playing products such as Cthuloide Welten and Cthulhu Now, before retiring after a decade of work in 2011 (shortly after Heller) did, and has since worked freelance in Media Design, Graphic Design, Corporate Design, and Illustration.

Comments / Trivia

• Notes, hints and anecdotes about Manfred Escher are completely lacking in his works, notably the otherwise excellent overview of Escher's work, Cthulhu Design (Portfolio), which contained little a great deal of information about the products Escher designed and contributed art for, but very little detail about the artist himself. Much of the biography above was pieced together from archives of the nyarlathotep.de website, Escher's announcement of resignation from Pegasus following Heller, and what little else is known publicly about Heller's career at Pegasus based on vague credits in the content he contributed to.

Artwork

An example of Manfred Escher's characteristic artwork: 1st Ed. Spieler-Handbuch

See the covers and other artwork for a range of Cthulhu-themed Pegasus Press game products and magazines over the early 2000s, including:

• Cthuloide Welten
• 1st and 2nd Editions of the Pegasus German-Language Call of Cthulhu Player's Handbook and Keeper's Handbook
• Cthulhu Now (Setting)
• Mittelalter(Setting)
• Cthulhu 1000 A.D. - Cthulhu Dark Ages
• Horror im Orient-Express (Kampagne), Chaugnar Faugns Fluch (Kampagne), Nocturnum (Kampagne)
• Terror Britannicus (Abenteuer), Aus Aeonen (Abenteuer), Geisterschiffe (Abenteuer), Bleicher Mond (Abenteuer), Jenseits der Schwelle (Abenteuer), Wenn Engel Fallen (Abenteuer), Zeitlose Ängste (Abenteuer), Expeditionen (Abenteuer), Der Teufelsplan des Fu Manchu (Abenteuer), Tage des Mondes (Abenteuer), Unfassbare Mächte (Abenteuer), Todesangst (Abenteuer), Grauen in Arkham (Abenteuer), Sturm auf Innsmouth (Abenteuer), Der Blutstern (Abenteuer Spielbuch), Das schleichende Grauen (Abenteuer Spielbuch)
• Wien (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Kingsport (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Dunwich (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), New York (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Festival Obscure (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Geheimnisvolles Marokko (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Dementophobia (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Niemandsland (Quellen- und Abenteuerband), Necronomicon (Quellenbuch), Arcana Cthulhiana (Quellenbuch), Waffen-Handbuch (Quellenbuch), USA (Quellenbuch), Arkham (Quellenbuch), Innsmouth (Quellenbuch), Verschlusssache (Quellenbuch)
• Sichtschirm + Feuer & Asche (Spielleiterschirm)
• Cthulhu Design (Portfolio)

Links

• https://www.yog-sothoth.com/profile/280-creatronic/
• http://www.rollenspiel-almanach.de/manfred-escher-verlasst-cthulhu/
• https://www.die-dorp.de/index.php/rezensionen/rollenspiele/cthulhu/940-cthulhu-design
• https://web.archive.org/web/20010405131312/http://www.nyarlathotep.de:80/home_frame.htm
• https://www.xing.com/profile/Manfred_Escher
• http://radaris.de/p/Manfred/Escher/
• http://www.manicor.de
• Contact: [email protected]