Bill and I both worked hard on his Halloween costume, and he looked amazing.
We took a lot of pictures. Wouldn’t you? Come on man, it was a look for the ages, and Bill carried it off like he had been dressing as a wizard his whole life. As the king of the wizards. If he encountered any other wizards in the wild, they would recognize his superiority through scent and visual display, and immediately cede their territory to Bill.
One photograph in particular: Bill was in a dynamic hero pose, framed against a bright background of yellow leaves, looking out into the distance.
The costume wasn’t even finished yet when I took the picture. But it was the first time that all the pieces came together, and Bill got the chance to see what it felt like to wear the whole thing. I could tell that Bill was loving it, and this picture captured him finding that character: Morihar, a wizard of grandeur and mystery!
For the last couple of years I’ve basically just been making masks. It’s been a while since I painted stuff on canvas.
But the mask show is over now, and lately I’ve been thinking about painting again. What better way to reconnect with my roots than painting a portrait of Bill in his Morihar costume? Plus, the folks at my local library offered their space to show some art, and that sounded like just the sort of thing to get me back to work. And it was almost Christmas!
So I would begin a new series of work, for a show at the library, by painting a portrait of Bill in his Halloween costume, and give it to him for Christmas! That was a plan so crazy it just might work. I started the canvas in the middle of November and really took my time. It was a joy to make.
Bill gradually came to terms with the fact that he will have to spend the rest of his life living with a portrait of himself as a magical wizard. Here are some pictures of the work in progress:
