Additions to the site, November 2021

It’s been more than a year since this site was updated, and we have plenty of great additions that have accumulated during that time. Sorry for keeping everyone waiting, but, well, there were more than a few distractions until recently (few of them good, starting with the most deadly global pandemic since 1918; ugh!)

First off, this site’s two primary editors, Barry Biediger and Jim DeRogatis, have launched a podcast, Small Subjects: Big Topics About Miniatures & Modeling, which you can find here. It’s not only about box dioramas—we hope to cover a wide range of topics about miniature sculpting and painting, along with interviewing the top artists in this field—but, of course, given our primary passion, there’s talk about boxes, too. We hope you’ll give it a listen! (In addition to the link above, you can find us streaming on all of the major podcast platforms, including Spotify, Apple, and Overcast, and we are hosting a blog for the show with images we discuss in each episode on this site here.)

We are always especially happy to add new artists’ galleries to the site. For this update, you can find additions fromMMSI President and veteran modeler Joe Berton, who just did his first box diorama this year, “Van Gogh’s Bedroom”; a fun gallery for creative (and monster-movie-obsessed) Australia modeler Alain Lunke; a gallery of the the classically-inspired boxes by Victor Wong, and the first box-diorama efforts by Italian modeler Antonio Marcello, Pennsylvania modeler Gary Sausmikat, and South African modeler Richard E. Mason.

New boxes have also been added to several of the existing artists’ galleries (at least everyone was busy during COVID!). These include the gold-medal-winning “Nevermore” tribute to Edgar Allen Poe by Bob Bethea; Jim DeRo’s latest box, “Samhain,” which won a Silver Medal at the MFCA Virtual Show in 2021 (there are also new and better pictures by Bob Sarnowski of “Adieu!,” which claimed a Silver Medal in historical at MMSI 2021, and “Witches to their Sabbath,” an MMSI Gold Medal in fantasy in 2021); Greg DiFranco’s newest lighted flats box, “Saint George and the Dragon”; Nick Infield’s new box “Ray Harryhausen and Mighty Joe Young” (along with a photo of his first box, “Napoleon and Berthier on Campaign”), and the latest by Andy Axtell, “Daniel in the Lions’ Den.”

Finally, we’ve added two very nice boxes by an unknown French modeler to the Various Artists page (and any info would be most welcome!), along with two pseudo-boxes that Jim Rice displayed at the 2021 MMSI Chicago Show, and in the Feature Articles section, you’ll find some great photos of museum dioramas that come from the blog run by modeler and diorama enthusiast N. Kalis, who chronicles these pieces in his blog here.

Thanks as always for clicking around, and we hope you enjoy!