Friday, December 23, 2005

The Evil Eye


For a horror fanatic like me, the higlight of horror movies from the 80's was A Nightmare On Elm Street, released in 1984.

This painting of Freddy Krueger was done around 1987. I was studying commercial art at Utah Valley Community College at the time. This is a classic example of being sorely dissapointed at a class in college. I had taught myself airbrushing back when I was in high school, so once I got into college I was excited to see they offered a basic airbrushing class. After the first day in class, I could tell it was going to be a waste of time. I had hoped to learn a some new techniques, but it was a very very basic class.I usually skipped the classes and showed up for the tests. For our final, the instructor asked us to choose whatever subject matter we liked and paint it up with the airbrush. I found a very cool photo of Freddy Krueger in an issue of FANGORIA magazine and decided the facial scarring would be a great challenge to tackle. I was at a point in my life where I was growing frustrated with school and a few other life choices, so about 3 days before this final painting was due, I decided to hit the road to Las Vegas to go hang out with my cousin and just forget about everything else. I drove back home late, and had basically 1 evening to produce the painting. I stayed up all night painting, and this was the result.
My favorite memory of this painting is from when I was dating my wife to be. I had this painting propped up on a table in my basement bedroom. After watching a movie, it was late at night and dark when she was getting ready to leave. While looking at the painting as she walked past, she said the eye seemed to be following her, and it gave her the creeps the whole way home. There is NO higher compliment than knowing your artwork evoked a response like that!

7 comments:

Andrew Glazebrook said...

Cool pic ! Freddy was still at his best in the first Elm Street movie though !!!

pati said...

Ohhh... one of the first movies I saw as a grown up lady :)

Terrific illo!

Michelle Lana said...

awww man....loved watching horror movies...esp freddie krueger!!!

Larry Lee said...

Freddy Krueger was definitely the 80s. I was not a fan of the horror films. But, I was amused by the fact that Robert Englund also played the timid and probably most likeable alien lizard from 'V' the miniseries (also from the 80s).
BTW: Robert Englunds wikipedia entry has a copy of the original photo that your painting is based on.

Brine Blank said...

Be glad there was at least and airbrush class out there! Not so much anymore and definitely a nice talent to have...nice job on the painting...

Willie Baronet said...

Wow, very nice!

Michelle said...

oooh.. very nice! Great job on the detail!