Halloween Society Unearthed
The Halloween Society, founded in the late 1980s, was an exclusive club dedicated to the maskmakers' art. Now its colorful history and dramatic influence is documented in Ron Magid's two-volume memoir, The Halloween Society Unearthed and The Halloween Society Unmasked.
The Halloween Society Unearthed reveals how this secret society revolutionized the collecting world, becoming a nexus for the creations of pioneering maskmakers from the legendary Don Post Studios to modern masters like Trick Or Treat Studios, through startling anecdotes profusely illustrated via unseen images culled from The Halloween Society archives.
It began with a lengthy run of meticulously crafted fanzines, The Allhallows Eve Companion and The Halloween Gazette, inspiring a whole generation of new artists and collectors. These sought after issues rank among the rarest publications ever created and are reprinted here for the first time ever, illuminated by Magid's untold tales of their making.
The Halloween Society Unearthed relates how, on a dare, The Halloween Society became mask makers themselves, offering deluxe, extremely limited edition masks based on classic movie monsters exclusively to their members. These legendary Custom Collectors Editions - including first-ever renditions of Bela Lugosi from 1931's Dracula, and the Robotrix from 1927's Metropolis among many others - soon became the gold standard as maskmaking exploded into a worldwide industry whose wares are revered at massive conventions like Monsterpalooza and MaskFest.
The Halloween Society Unearthed tells the strange but true story of The Halloween Society: from its humble beginnings as a simple forum for fellow mask collectors; to its growth as publisher of elaborate, lovingly hand-assembled magazines with unlikely titles like The Allhallows Eve Companion and The Halloween Gazette; and finally, how on a dare, The Halloween Society became mask makers themselves, offering deluxe, extremely limited edition masks based on classic movie monsters to its members.
Halloween Society Unmasked
The Halloween Society, founded in the late 1980s, transformed monster masks from disposable products to bonafide works of art. Now its colorful history and dramatic influence is documented in Ron Magid's two-volume memoir, The Halloween Society Unearthed and The Halloween Society Unmasked.
The Halloween Society Unmasked continues the strange but true story of this secret society whose elaborate, lovingly hand-assembled fanzines, The Allhallows Eve Companion and The Halloween Gazette, argued that masks created by Don Post, Distortions Unlimited, House of Horror Studios and many others were deserving of being collected, preserved and even critiqued.
These sought-after issues are reprinted here for the first time ever, illuminated by Magid's untold tales of their making, along with detailed tales of the creation of The Halloween Society's 13 deluxe, extremely limited Custom Collectors Edition masks, available exclusively to its members. Inspired by Don Post’s Universal Studios monsters, these first-ever renditions - including Fredric March from 1932's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Lon Chaney Sr. from London After Midnight, and Paul Wegener as Der Golem to name but a few - are considered among the rarest masks of all time and became the new gold standard as maskmaking exploded into a worldwide industry celebrated at massive conventions like Monsterpalooza and MaskFest.