Bettina Kurkoski
Residence
Current:	Plymouth, Massachusetts[1]
Past:	Montague, Massachusetts[2]
Date of Birth
March 26, 1973[3]
Novels
Warriors Series:	The Rise of Scourge
Other Novels:	Toklo's Story, Kallik's Adventure, Lusa's Tale

Bettina Kurkoski is an artist who did artwork for some of the Warriors graphic novels.^[4]

BiographyEdit

She was born on March 26, 1973, near Montague, Massachusetts.^[5] She currently resides in Plymouth, Massachusetts,^[6] and was educated at Plymouth North High School where she achieved a degree in General Studies and went on to The University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, where she earned a BFA in Illustration.^[7] After she graduated, she began searching for art-realated jobs, but shortly after that, tradgedy struck, and she was hospitalized and underwent surgery.^[8]

When she recovered, she started all over again, and using the internet, she launched her own web page to showcase her work.^[9] After her friends told her about TOKYOPOP's Rising Stars of Manga 2 competition,^[10] she applied for the competition in 2003, and got placed as runner-up.^[11] Bettina did the OEL manga, My Cat Loki,^[12] and it was her first proffesionally published series (published by Tokyopop).^[13]

She also illustrated the exclusive cover for Star Trek the Manga: Shinsei Shinei, both cover and short story "Communication Breakdown" for Star Trek the Manga: Kakan ni Shinkou and Warriors: Rise of Scourge (due out in June 2008), all published from TOKYOPOP.^[14]

QuotesEdit

"That's my story and I'm sticking to it!"

"Well, I've pretty much been drawing since I can remember! Througout elementary school, I'd entertain myself drawing thousand of pictures of Garfield. By the time I hit seventh grade, I was bitten by the comic book bug and had a healthy dosage of anime: "Robotech", "Starblazers", "Voltron", "Force Five", "Tranzer Z" and other cartoons such as "Thundercats", "He-Man", "G.I. Joe", "Silverhawks", "Galaxy Rangers". I then began creating my own characters and comics with a very eighties flare to their styles! By my Junior year in high school I discovered fantasy illustration thru the likes of Boris Vallejo and Frank Frazetta. Then went off to college, majored and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Illustration from UMass-Dartmouth. After college, I took up some regular Joe jobs to pay back college loans and rekindled my love for anime, which I had all but forgotten during high school and college and have been thoroughly addicted to anime since 1996! Thru this addiction my style evolved with a very anime look to it. Even though I did go to college, I'm pretty much eighty percent self taught! There are a lot of things I learned on my own during high school, college and even after college! This doesn't mean you don't have to go to get a good

art education . I highly recommend going, if not, for the fun alone and you'll be more inspired to work with like-minded people all around you!"^[15]

WorksEdit

She did the artwork for The Rise of Scourge in the Warriors Series, and also for books 1, 2 and 3 of the Seekers Manga, also by Erin Hunter. Her other works are as follows:

• Rising Stars of Manga vol. 2 (2003)^[16]
• My Cat Loki vol. 1 (2006)^[17]
• Star Trek: TOS manga vol. 1 (2007)^[18]
• My Cat Loki vol. 2 (2007)^[19]
• Star Trek: TOS manga vol. 2 (2008)^[20]
• Princess Ai: Encounters vol. 1 (2008)^[21]
• Star Trek: TNG manga vol. 1 (2009)^[22]
• Toklo's Story^[23]
• Kallik's Adventure^[24]
• Lusa's Tale^[25] (work in progress)

External LinksEdit

• Bettina's Personal Website
  
• Bettina on DeviantArt
• An Interview with Bettina on Warrior's Wish
• bettina@dreamworldstudio.net
• bettinakurkoski@gmail.com

References and CitationsEdit