Grendel - Talking, Talking, Spinning a Spell

“Talking, Talking, Spinning a Spell - Grendel” • 2022 • 12” x 18” • watercolor and gouache on watercolor paper

“I nosed out, in my childish games, every last shark-toothed chamber and hall, every black tentacle of my mother’s cave, and so came at last, adventure by adventure, to the pool of firesnakes. I stared, mouth gaping. They were gray as old ashes; faceless, eyeless. They spread the surface of the water with pure green flame. I knew — I seemed to have known all along — that the snakes were there to guard something. Inevitably, after I’d stood there a while, rolling my eyes back along the dark hallway, my ears cocked for my mother’s step, I screwed my nerve up and dove. The firesnakes scattered as if my flesh were charmed. And so I discovered the sunken door, and so I came up, for the first time, to moonlight.”

From my favorite book
Grendel - by John Gardner

I love this character so much. I’d painted several versions of him over the years and each time it’s different. There is something of him in a lot of the characters I created, especially for my comics. I often think that if I had a wish it would be to be a monster of the forest and caves and to sit, fur-covered on a high hill, at the edge of the tree line deep in a mountain forest, knowing of silenced animals all around, and watch the sunset for a thousand years.

This print is 12" x 18"

Art is printed as close to the scale of original painting as possible.
Printed on enhanced matte poster paper.
Printed and order fulfillment through Printful.