Re-Wrapping The Mummy

A little lesson on why it is sometimes worth the effort to go back and re-examine a piece that just didn't work out the way you envisioned.

This oil of Boris Karloff as Ardath Bey, a.k.a. THE MUMMY, was my very first classic monster painting. It seemed fine while I was working on it, but I was still learning the process at the time, and so I rushed it. I didn't listen to my inner Gogos, and was too much of a hurry to see the final result. It wasn't until is was "finished" that I noticed the problems with the sketch itself - the proportions were way off, so the likeness suffered.

For almost a year that painting sat on my studio floor, and every time I passed by it I would grimace. Finally, while in the middle of another painting, I had had enough. I put the new piece aside and put this one back on the easel. Within an hour, I had captured the image I had always imagined it would be. Suddenly I loved the painting I had shunned for so long. In fact, I now liked it so much I decided to take it a step further, and glazed color onto it's Burnt Umber and Titanium White tones. The result was so worth the effort, I was only sorry I hadn't resolved to fix it sooner. See for yourself...

The original painting...

The revised version...

And the final, glazed painting.

Lesson learned.