These two models are the WIA plastic release of Brigitte Eberl's Mini Gustav. I've had a poke around and can't find out much about WIA to know what else their range includes - I haven't even been able to find a company homepage let alone a shop site - most of the search results are pages or quotes from random Google books, or other hobbyists' mentions of the WIA horses in their collection. So all I've seen are these, one other 1/18th scale horse, and some 1/9th scale resins, all on Modellpferdeversand, the multi-brand model horse retailer based in Germany.
If anyone knows where WIA are hiding their info, do let me know in the comments!
So, what are the horses like? In hand, they feel very much like a Collecta or Schleich model, to pick a couple of more familiar names compare to - a good solid plastic with a decent weight to it, very slightly flexible in that reassuring way which means they'll probably bounce entirely unharmed if you knock them over or drop them.
They're a slightly smaller scale than Collecta, but not enough that they couldn't join a mixed herd if you wanted them to pose in group scenes for photos or live showing. I've got one Gustav standing next to my Belgian mare to check, and she's maybe a touch over half an inch taller at the withers, which you could pass off as her being a 17hh example of her breed, and him being a 15.2hh example of his!
The sculpting is, of course, quite lovely, and the paintwork's a good bit over and above the typical standard for these OF middling-scale plastics - rather than being toys which some adults do collect, like the mass produced brands of Schleich, Safari, Bullyland, Papo, Mojo, and Collecta, these are aimed firmly at the adult collector, who appreciates an anatomically, conformationally accurate horse, with a realistic pose and expression.
I can't see any record of how many are made, so I've no idea if they're a small limited run or whether it went to a few hundred or thousand, but they seem to be an MPV exclusive (I got mine second hand on UK Ebay)
Here's a really lovely picture of the bay, he looks so warm and glowy in this light but it's actually just me forgetting to change my camera settings from a very cloudy previous day!
This is more accurate for his colouring, a beautifully rich bay with mealy shading and a hint of grey on his face, elbows, and stifles. He's even got some gentle dapples on his ginger belly and beside his tail. And look at his eyes, they're realistically painted in, and even glossed - this is OF paintwork that easily rivals some CM paintjobs in attention to detail, they've done a great job on him.
This might be my favourite angle for him, with that high head carriage and flash of eye-white as he looks at us. The original Gustav resin was a very big Traditional scale, this little guy has every bit the same amount of pride and presence!
Another angle which shows off his handsome and expressive head, I really like that roman nose!
And here's the leopard spotted edition, which I'm going to have as a Noriker horse - in fact, I'm calling them both Norikers; most horse books pick a spotted example to show, so that's the first thing I thought of when getting a spotted draft for my collection, but there's a lot of solid colours in the breed too.
Much like the Lipizzaner, the Noriker has a particular naming system, where the horse's first name is what he's known as individually, and his second name is what stallion line he's from. My spotted one will be Julius Elmar (the Elmar line being the source of the spotted/tiger pattern), the bay will be called Maxim Nero.
You can't really see it too well in the photos, but his spots are nicely done, with faint mapping and layering of airbrushed colour, to make them more than just the usual stencilled or blobbed-on solid dots.
I can't help thinking he'd look great dressed up in a traditional stallion set, with roller, side reins, and bridle, trimmed & decorated with different colours of leather (often red and white on black) which you often see on the continental draft breeds. But I've never made tack smaller than Julip/Classic scale, so I'm not sure how ready I am for that challenge!
Here's a little headshot. There were two of the spotted model on Ebay, I chose this one because I liked his face the most - the other had an almost solid black head, the shading on mine makes it look like he's got a lot of roaning with his appaloosa pattern.
So that's my two Noriker boys, Julius and Maxim. Which colour do you like best? Or are you, like me, more of a 'both!' kind of collector? And oh but wouldn't it be great to get my hands on some custom bodies at some point, I could have a lot of fun with this mould if a nice cheap scuffed one ever needed a new coat of paint...
No comments:
Post a Comment