Hello and thank you for agreeing for this interview Mr. Baertsch! Would you kindly tell us a little about yourself and your relationship with MOTU overall?
Hello!
My relationship with Masters of the Universe goes all the way back to 1982. I've been a fan since I first laid eyes and hands on the figures. I remember the 8-back had just barely hit our area, and only the first four were available. My parents were so kind to get me all four very early on. Within a couple months of them hitting stores. When I got He-Man I remember getting him with Battle Cat as that 2 pack box art is what I remember most clearly.
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| Rudy Obrero's He-Man and Battle Cat 2-pack box-art painting. |
I also got Beast Man around the same time. Shortly after those initial figures, I got Man-At-Arms and Skeletor on Christmas. I was hooked! I would get a few more over the years, including Castle Grayskull and other figures and vehicles. I enjoyed the cartoon like everyone else, and by the time I was in Jr. High school, I was still secretly playing with the toys at home, and drawing the characters constantly.
I would often copy or try to draw the mini comic pages, Alfredo P. Alcala, Rudy Obrero and William George's works in particular had the biggest influence on me, and that was how I preferred the world of Eternia. I enjoyed the movie unlike most that were my age, and through High School and College I would still fill my notebooks with scribbles of He-Man, Skeletor and the gang.
When the 200X line came around I was a new member on He-Man.org and would post fan art in the forums under the name of "Baena" (My own name rearranged based on a "star wars name" formula).
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Well, those sketches and pieces of fan art were well received in the community, and even caught the eyes of Val Staples (JVS3 on the forums) and the Four Horsemen.
Val asked me when he was producing the MVCreations comics for the brand, to do a cover here and there.
It started with me helping color, and then progressed to me doing the full art duties on the covers. I never had the time to actually help with any interior art on those comics, but that's okay, we all love what Emiliano Santalucia and Enza Fontana did!
Below some of the official cover arts and colors for MVCreations by Nate
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To see the entire Comic Cover gallery for 2002 He-Man series,
Below Nate's colors on linearts by Emiliano Santalucia and Enza Fontana (fan commissions).
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Below Nate's potrayal of Glimmer and Queen Angella for the BCI Art Cards (2006) Filmation She-Ra DVDs
As 200X faded away into Stactions and then died, MotU Classics had begun to take the scene, and at that time my own relationship with the Four Horsemen began to take off. I helped them occasionally with design sheets from time to time.
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The most well known design sheets I did were for both the Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain play sets. Dreams do come true. And I still look back on those jobs with great memories and excitement.
Eventually, after a very long run, the Classics line ended. Mattel had taken back the reins for the property and had begun their Origins and Masterverse lines, at around the same time Netflix had started their animation show Revelation. Through my old time connections to Ted Biaselli way back to the He-Man.org days, he asked if I would do the key art for the show!
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It was amazing working with Ted and the Netflix team on those pieces, both for Revelation and Revolution. At that same time, the universe must have aligned for me, because I was doing a lot of art for the Masterverse toy line with Mattel, increased Freelance for the Four Horsemen and the Netflix shows, which ended up with me finally becoming a full time employee with Four Horsemen Studios. I am still, and always will be, a mega fan of Masters of the Universe. And I maybe still have a slight crush on the Green Goddess, ahem, Sorceress.
How did you end up working for the Four Horsemen Studios?
I started working with the Four Horsemen when they asked me to do some artwork for their Seventh Kingdom line. They wanted to involve fans more with the work they were doing, especially for their Fantastic Exclusive figures. Ramathorr was the first piece of art I did for them, and it's slowly grown since from one or two paintings a year, to working with them full time as their main illustrator.
How did you end up working for the Four Horsemen Studios?
I started working with the Four Horsemen when they asked me to do some artwork for their Seventh Kingdom line. They wanted to involve fans more with the work they were doing, especially for their Fantastic Exclusive figures. Ramathorr was the first piece of art I did for them, and it's slowly grown since from one or two paintings a year, to working with them full time as their main illustrator.
What other properties have you worked on besides MOTU?
That relationship with the Four Horsemen has given me the amazing opportunities to work on other very cool properties from our childhood, such as Superman, Batman, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Thundercats and Silverhawks. Even some others that I cannot share here, that are still under wraps. Maybe someday we can show the world what could have been?
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What project from Mattel's Masters of the Universe has been your favorite?
Some of my favorite work with Mattel has been the collaborations I've gotten to do with Axel Giménez.
The Origins Castle Grayskull artwork in particular is probably one of the most epic pieces I've gotten to do with him.
It was a little different than other "coloring" jobs, because most of the time when you color someone's work, you are coloring under their line layers, so that you can still see their line work. With this job, I painted over top of Axel's pencils.
I tried to treat it the way William George would with his own pencil sketches that then became oil paintings. So the Castle Grayskull art to me, even though it was done digitally, still has an almost old school oil painting style to it that I love.
So you've both illustrated and colored art for MOTU. Do you prefer one role over the other?
I don't know if I have a preference for doing my own work vs. collaborating with another artist. At the end of the day, I'm just happy and thankful I got the job! Regardless of how it was done. Working with other artists that I am friends with is always a treat.
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| 30th Anniversary DVD boxset packaging art |
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| 40th Anniversary toy packaging art |
Axel and I did get to do a mini-comic together for DC Comics and the Classics line, we did issue 7 of those mini-comics, Axel drew it, I colored.
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Then later for Origins I got to do the third wave Mini Comic, in an opposite sort of way. I did the line work on that one, and someone else colored it.
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Both comics had a lot to love about the process. But due to my time now with the Horsemen, I don't foresee any more comic work in my future. Maybe a cover though? Maybe? [After the interview was conducted, Dark Horse teased about a one-shot comic for ANDRA (from Masters of the Universe Revelation & Revolution), where the writer Tiffany Smith revealed that one of the variant covers will be by Mr. Baertsch]
What lead you into working on the Masterverse packaging artworks? (And New Eternia)
Working on Masterverse, New Eternia in particular was a ton of fun for the time. The line had just begun and Roy Juarez really wanted me to do all of them! And I wanted to do all of them! Eamon was doing all of the Revelation figures at the time, and I think Roy had a vision of different artists doing their own lines as it were. But due to other work I had, it was difficult for me to keep up with Mattel's aggressive schedule of characters, so I had to bow out.
But I loved doing every character I could, I really love the vision of the New Eternia line in general, how it takes its design cues from the early development work on the original figures. Roy had been working with me previously on the Origins art and really wanted to see what I could bring to New Eternia I think. I didn't pitch for it in any way, it was simply Roy coming to me.
There are a few other artists working on the Masterverse packaging (Simon Eckert, Eamon O'Donoghue and Joseph Zacate), do you have a say in who will work on which character?
Roy is the master Packaging Designer and ultimately he was the one that decided who worked on what. I love Eamon and Simon and Joseph's work on the line and feel like the art chores are still in amazingly talented hands. Simon's work in particular just floors me every time I see a new piece that he's done.
The new story told in the New Eternia packages is written by Robert Rudman, and packaging designer is Roy Juarez. Have you interacted with both on the artistic choices made for the illustrations?
I don't have anything to do with the story overall, that's all Mattel. But when I work with Roy on the packaging, he'll come to me with some initial ideas and art direction, and then I'm pretty free to l play within that realm and do what I think will look best. Most of the time it's well received. Sometimes I may have to make minor adjustments.
The description for the toyline tells about taking vintage concepts and breathing new life into them. How was the process like for the art itself?
When I start a new piece of art, especially for New Eternia, I usually go back to my MotU art books and pour over the references of the original designs, the old mini comics and story books, and I may even watch a cartoon episode here and there. That is if I have the time for such a luxury. Most of the time I have to complete the art much faster than I'm used to, and so sometimes it just pours out of my brain and we get what we get. But if you look at the pieces, you can usually point to older art pieces and see where I was influenced.
There is a version of the "Viking He-Man" art where he is wielding the Powersword instead of the axe, and missing the helmet and shoulder pads. Please tell us more about that.
So the first art for the Viking He-Man, Roy and I had discussed what weapons He-Man should be holding, what armor he should have on, etc. Because the He-Man figure could be displayed as a Viking hero, or more like his classic toy version. We had decided to go with him not having the helmet on and wielding the sword for the main back art.
Then, after a meeting at Mattel with other managers and whatnot, they came back and asked to show the helmet and axe instead. It's as simple as that! And because I work digitally, it wasn't a big chore to make those changes. I wish this was a cooler story, but it is what it is.
In the end it does make more sense to showcase the new elements of the figure on the big image on the back, and have a more classic look elsewhere. Because we all know the classic look, but it's way fun to show off the new elements of these figures.
Your illustrations have made homages to artists like Frazetta and Alfredo P. Alcala. Is there any homage you wanted to reference but haven't been able to?
I've been lucky to reference my main influences in both Origins and Masterverse. As I stated my influences above, you can see a bit of all of them in the work I've done. I wouldn't be where I am today had those masters not inspired me the way they did.
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In the Beast Man [2022] packaging you depicted a race of Beastmen, including a female of the species. Whose idea was it to include her and might we see her pop up in future artworks?
The female Beastwoman! She was born just right out of my noggin. The story states that Beast Man is a king of Beast men. Well, you don't get Beast men without Beast Women... So there we go. Plus, I'm just a fan of fleshing out more of the world of these characters, much like Mattel's writers, we all know it's fun to explore this world of Eternia and add to it.
There wasn't a need to change any existing character, I just had fun making up my own Beast people. I'm super happy she's gotten some notice amongst the fans and the good people at Mattel.
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| Nate's fan art of the Beast Woman (a nod to Raquel Welch) |
Of course I would love it if we actually got a figure of her! I know Simon illustrated her again on the recent New Eternia Beast Man variant!
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How long does it take to illustrate the main artwork and a side-view art? What tools do you use?
The paintings would vary in the time they would take to do. But in general, a painting takes me about a week to a week and a half to do. Some take less, some take more, but that's a good average. As I mentioned I work digitally, what that means is I work in Photoshop and I use a Cintiq Tablet.
I've made many of my own digital brushes that I use to get certain effects. My process is pretty straight forward, I start with what looks like a pencil sketch done digitally, I'll throw quick background colors in to give a sense of what pallet I want to use, and then it's the long hard work of painting out all the details.
Example below from a He-Man.org fan-art project with a winter-themed 2002 Teela
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Here's a look at the She-Ra piece, I had started, but had to hand off to another artist to finish. But you can see how loose I start these images. I'm looking mainly for composition within the space I can work on the die lines. You can also see how I've pulled in reference and inspirational pieces as I work. You can see, Simon has inspired me a long time before we got him working on the line.
I also had started work on the 1987 He-Man and Skeletor movie figures, but then handed that job off to Eamon, who finished it beautifully!
[Above concept artwork by Nate Baertsch, featuring the 1987 movie versions of He-Man versus Skeletor in front of the Throne of Grayskull.]
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[Below the final artworks for Masterverse by Eamon O'Donoghue. Showcasing the differences such as Skeletor's
showing a space backdrop and for He-Man a Grayskull backdrop]
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Are there any specific guidelines on how to approach the main art, in comparison to the side-art?
The only main thing that influences the side art vs the back art would be: 1. direction from Roy and 2. the die lines tell me what kind of canvas I have to work with. And in general, the thought process has been that the side was a nice spot to show just the figure with it's alternate portrait looming above, and then the back could be a more illustrative action scene with the figure.
Below Nate's Side Artworks for New Eternia packaging.
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Is there a character you'd like to see get a New Eternia figure?
The next New Eternia figure that NEEDS to be done is Teela. And then the Green Goddess/Sorceress. ;) I've been bugging Mattel about that for years. I think they're holding those two back just to spite me. LOL!
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| Nate's fan-art of vintage Teela in Alcala-style. |
Recently we saw your art on the new MOTU "Vintage Collection" Skeletor. Are there more MOTU Projects coming where you are attached?
The Skeletor piece for the Vintage Collection is probably the last piece I'll do for a while. I'd love to come back to Eternia and play with so many of my fellow artist friends there, but time is something I need more of.
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If I could get by on less sleep, or if Earth's orbit could slow a little to give us more hours in the day? Then that would be fabuloso. The worlds of Mythic Legions, Cosmic Legions and Figura Obscura are taking all of my time up for now.
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Who knows what the future holds?
Thank you very much!
Interview conducted by Jukka Issakainen [Feb. 11th, 2025 - revised Feb 25th]
What a cool interview and some very nice peeks behind the curtain. Great job!
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