Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Blemmyes are a head below the rest






Blemmyes were a race of headless creatures said to live somewhere around Ethiopia or other parts of North Africa in Ancient times. They had no heads, but had faces in the middle of their chest. They are fairly obscure mythological figures. In the late 90s I included them in an Arabian Nights themed novel as guardians of a mysterious treasure located in Northeast Africa. I did a small clay version of them and used the design in a cover painting for the book. In 2007 I did a computer generated version as a learning project. I altered the design when I realized the face couldnt be too big if it were to be even remotely possible, anatomically speaking (the mouth in the previous version would run right into the spine).
The photo with the fiery skeleton illustrates a scene from the novel.

2 comments: