Mother Medusa

tiny-mother-medusa

Sometimes I like to think that I’m a bit of a metalhead. Then Eleanor makes fun of me for it and I realize how square I really am.

Lately, I’d been feeling the itch to try to do something a little bit different. Most all of my “professional art career” I’ve always been playing the role of working within someone else’s style. So I’ve been trying to make it a point to set aside time to do some personal work. Some self indulgent explorations if you will. So in a fit of feeling a little bit like a metalhead something kinda clicked.

To make a long story short, a friend of mine has thought that Mother Medusa was the most badass name for anything that ever was. It turns out to be the name of a hot rod in a modern day B movie that he had watched. I have yet to watch the film, but to me the name felt like something out of a neo-classical painting. For some reason I found myself thinking about it and a couple of visuals popped into my mind. After some image searching I found the proper paintings that I had been thinking of. Two very similar pieces by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, The Queen of Angels and Virgin with the Lily. Since both of these paintings are very religious I looked to the work of Becky Cloonan and Jeanne D’Angelo to help me “darken” it up a bit. I thought I was done with it and then Eleanor told me to put some flames on it. Now I’m just left struggling with how Medusa got pregnant in the first place.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "Virgin with the Lily".

William-Adolphe Bouguereau’s “Virgin with the Lily”.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "Queen of Angels"

William-Adolphe Bouguereau’s “Queen of Angels”

Promo art for the band "The Sword" by Becky Cloonan

Promo art for the band “The Sword” by Becky Cloonan

"Medusa" by Jeanne D'Angelo

“Medusa” by Jeanne D’Angelo