Taral Wayne, early furry fandom artist, passes away

Taral Wayne (born Wayne MacDonald), a Canadian artist in both science fiction and furry fandoms, passed away last week at age 72. (October 12, 1951 - July 31, 2024.)

I had the opportunity to hang out with Taral many times from about 1994-2001 until I moved away, after which I sadly let myself become more distant. If you were a friend or colleague of Taral's, even if you're not in furry fandom, please feel free to post a comment or personal memory here!

Taral Wayne was a resident of Toronto and discovered science fiction fandom in the early 1970s. Within the next ten years he was an active participant, lending his artistic talents to zine culture. He was also a member of the proto-furry APA, Vootie.

On several occasions Taral bragged that the adult side of furry fandom was partially his fault, when he asked his fellow Vootie contributors why there wasn't more sex in funny animal comics. Reed Waller responded by drawing a short comic that in 1984 would evolve into a full comic book series, Omaha the Cat Dancer, whose mature content was one of the reasons for the creation of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

Taral's art was characterized by extremely precise black-and-white inked line-work. He was inspired by a myriad of artists such as Walt Kelly, Hergé, Osamu Tezuka, Jay Ward and others, but his style was very much his own.

He was nominated eleven times for the Hugo Award for Best Fan Artist, but never won. To partially make up for this, when Worldcon (the World Science Fiction Convention) came to Montreal in 2009, he was made Fan Guest of Honor. The con even built a full-size photographic replica of his apartment.

Taral lived at a very low income level, in subsidized housing in Parkdale, a neighbourhood in south-west Toronto along Queen Street West. In the 1990s it was mildly unsafe (by Toronto standards) and became more so when the right-wing provincial government cut services and many homeless residents of the large mental hospital in the area were let out to fend for themselves.

I met Taral around this time in the early 1990s through my friendship with Kratsminsch, the admin of The TrapLine BBS. (A pre-Internet local computer message forum). Kratsminsch was the person from whom I discovered furry fandom, and gradually our small circle of nerdy introverts would occasionally gather in Taral's tiny apartment, order cheap pizza and soda, to talk or watch videos.

Me, Kratsminsch, Maxi, MomentRabbit, Steven, some others... well, only three of us at any given time, there wasn't room for more. Toronto had very few furry artists, so being able to hang out with one, see what they were working on, and being able to look at his collection of zines and other memorabilia, it was very special to us.

Despite his small apartment, Taral had maximized its storage with amazing efficiency. He was a guy of multiple interests and collected things that he loved. The first thing you would notice coming into Taral's apartment were several tightly-packed bookshelves containing his large science fiction paperback book collection. Part of the wall of his living room around his television was covered with plastic model guns (unusual for a Canadian). Model vehicles were perched in many places.

Another wall had plastic 3D geographical relief maps. Another set of shelves was home to an extensive DVD collection. Figurines of characters from cartoons, TV shows and movies occupied any remaining space. And there was a vast collection of past artwork and zines hidden away in cabinets and drawers.

Despite his many interests, Taral was rather curmudgeonly and his demeanor could be easily interpreted as disinterest. But get him onto the right topic and you could find yourself having an in-depth conversation about any number of subjects. At one point while I was visiting he suddenly pulled out a collection of ancient Roman coins. He could also be very opinionated, and instead of trying to argue I found it was easier to nod along and shift the topic of conversation when an opportunity presented itself.

He also authored short stories, essays, and occasionally fan fiction. His hidden sense of humor could randomly manifest at any time. And if you could get him to crack a wry smile, you knew you had finally broken through the dour veneer. For those closer to him, every so once in a while he would email Broken Toys, and later The Biloobius, electronic newsletters containing his recent thoughts and musings.

Taral was nocturnal, waking up around 6 p.m. in the afternoon, and he was extremely reclusive. He attended cons very sporadically. When the TrapLine BBS finally went down, us introverts scattered, but still kept in touch for a while. The newest wave of Toronto furry fans consisted mostly of lifestylers and extroverts; unlike us, they had the social momentum to organize events. It was this group who created Camp Feral. In comparison, Taral was of a very different generation and kept to himself - yet still had tenuous links to the local fandom here and there. Even so, most furry fans in Toronto never knew he existed.

Despite his strong artistic talents, Taral didn't manage to become hugely successful, and for decades relied on hundreds and hundreds of art commissions. I was very happy when he collaborated with Steve Gallacci to make the comic Tales of Beatrix Farmer, but sadly it didn't continue. ("We think it has a certain 'je ne sais quoi'." - "What did we just say?" - "I don't know, what?")

After I moved away, I didn't keep in close touch with Taral or many people from my city of origin. Taral had a stroke in 2017. He recovered gradually, though his speech was slower than before. Other health problems led to him requiring a motorized chair to get around, that he dubbed "Travelling Matt", a reference to the TV show Fraggle Rock, which was very dear to him.

He tried to elicit my appreciation for the show as well, and despite him being about 20 years my senior, it just didn't hold the same meaning for me. However, I'm glad we got to share our time together. I remember watching The Cat Returns and Cats Don't Dance at his place. He introduced me to the point-and-click puzzle game The Neverhood. He generously gave me a free copy of "Heavy Nimh", an art print (not by him), because I said I liked it and he had a spare copy. I still have it to this day.

Our mutual friend Steven (from the old BBS days) was the one who noticed Taral wasn't responding to contact attempts, and alerted authorities to check on him. Now that he's passed on... part of the difficulty is that Taral wouldn't often mention his numerous friends, acquaintances and correspondents to each other. We all had our little separate experiences; to each of us, the other parts of his life were often a mystery. As a result, it's difficult to know what's going to happen. Did he make a will? Will there be a funeral service? He may have two distant sisters in Canada?

I'm deeply concerned about what's going to happen to Taral's many personal effects; he simply had so much... stuff, including a lot of obscure and irreplacable zines from furry fandom's early history. If anyone ends up being able to preserve and curate his belongings, they'll have a lot of work ahead. And will need a room or two of storage space.

I hope Taral's in a better place. Rest in peace, my friend.

For more information:

• Science fiction fandom sites that talk about Taral, his various publications, projects, and some of his collaborators:
  - File 770 (the source of the apartment photos)
  - Locus Mag
  
• A collection of his personal publications at eFanzines
  
• Fancyclopedia
  
• Wikipedia
  
• Wikifur
  
• And for his artwork, both science fictional and furry, ranging from clean, to suggestive, to kink, all mixed together:
  - FurAffinity (as Saara)
  - DeviantArt