Monsters in the Mind’s Eye

Another piece influenced by Pinterest. A guy had come up with individual surrealist characters that he drew, one per day, until he had a whole collection.

This appealed to my sense of freeform invention, and I soon had an idea for placing my own collection of characters on concentric ovoids. I populated these ovals with characters that came spontaneously. I tried not to think of conventional figures and vaguely remember looking at a number of Clive Barker paintings at the time (a favourite dark fantasy author of mine). The imagination ran riot. Some of the characters appear threatening, others aloof, still others seem humorous or tragic. After all, what is a monster but something we don’t understand and therefore fear? I was quite sad when I drew my last ‘monster’, as I had enjoyed the process so much.

Finally, I was left with the problem of what to do with the central ‘pupil’ of the eye. I defaulted to a zentangle-like mix of lines to complete the piece which I kinda liked.

I anticipate this being part of a series, as these monsters have many members of their extended family that are vying for canvas space!