The Medusa is a classic creature (of Greek mythology if you don't know, and if you don't know a classic creature like a medusa from mythology what are you doing liking D&D anyway). Too often I feel that these monster women, which in the myths turn people to stone though an overwhelming mystical ugliness, get portrayed in too sexy a way too often. Like, just a scaly hot chick with snakes for hair that turns you to stone because her eyes are magic or something.
In D&D, their petrification powers do come from their eyes (called petrifying gaze), so I guess you get a free pass for that. But I tried to get the more monstrous aspect of the original Medusa across because having a monster that turns you to stone through sheer ugliness just strikes me as more interesting than magic eyes. That's horror stuff right there. You can't even sneak up and kill her in her sleep because her awful melted, pockmarked, scarred, malformed, sunken, twisted, scaly, oozing face is like right there, man.
And then I up and come with something mildly unsexy but otherwise just a silhouette. I did have something a bit uglier in my sketchbook, but I started doing some silhouettes which just looked nicer. That and if I rendered Medusa's true face at the height of my capabilities I may not have an audience anymore. I do this for your own safety, folks.
The MCM Expo was quite swell, despite me messing up on printing times and being unable to bring new stock. Still, it was nice and I sold out on some of my things and got to talk to some nice people and get a handful of new followers out of the deal. Special hello to the nice girl that recognized me from the internet (always an ego boost). I hope that the rush at the MLP booth wasn't too taxing and that you're enjoying the goofy hippogriff drawing.
I really like the way this turned out. Very minimalistic.
ReplyDeleteWithout reading the title, you figure out a second later who you are looking at and then BAM! too late. ;]
I think most things are creepier when the details are hidden. Well done!
ReplyDeleteI really like this portrayal, but it annoys me whenever someone refers to it as "a medusa". Medusa is a name. In Greek mythology there are several gorgons, and Medusa is one of those.
ReplyDeleteI realize of course that you're drawing the D&D monster which is indeed called a medusa (in D&D gorgons are some sort of scaled bulls, which you probably know too), but since you've got that parenthesis there explaining the origin of Medusa I felt the need to correct you.
To the best of my knowledge D&D is actually the originator of this misconception, and it spread from there into various other pop culture.
Despite my annoyance at that misconception, I love this blog. Thanks for doing this stuff.
I'm familiar with the actual origin of the medusa/Medusa. I read a lot of (child-friendly) greek/roman mythology when I was young and am know that Medusa-with-a-capital-M is one of three sisters (the gorgons). However, I'm not really sure if her sistes were as ugly as her or whether she was the only one out of the three with supernatural petrifying ugliness.
DeleteI always felt so sorry for Medusa. Her and Scylla. (And Loki's family, in Norse myth, but that's a bit off-topic.)
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