Geraldine

Geraldine
Geraldine

This scene is based on fossils from the Geraldine Bonebed from the Early Permian Nocona Formation of Texas.

The sail-backed synapsid Edaphosaurus boanerges munches on the horsetail relative Sphenophyllum oblongifolium. In spite of its reptilian appearance, Edaphosaurus is more closely related to mammals. Edaphosaurids were one of the first tetrapod groups to become dedicated herbivores.

In the foreground several individuals of the spiny-headed terrestrial temnospondyl Zatrachys serratus come to the water’s edge to begin their courtship rituals. I am showing one male using an inflatable nasal sac to amplify its call; both sac and calling are speculative, but the speculation is based on the fact that zatrachydids possessed a very large fontanelle in the snout between the nostrils.

A juvenile of the embolomere Archeria crassidisca approaches the shallows from the right. This long-bodied aquatic tetrapod was common in earliest Permian strata of North America; it was one of the last members of its group.

Perry

The Permian was the last period of the Paleozoic Era; it ended with the most severe mass extinction in Earth’s history. This period was a time of great diversification and experimentation by a number of plant and animal clades, only a few of which made it through the great extinction to be the founders of the Mesozoic flora and fauna. I am working on illustrations of some of these organisms and landscapes from the end of multicellular life’s first great flowering.

Perry
Perry

The Wellington Formation of Kansas and Oklahoma is best known for its exceptionally preserved insect fossils, but it also has yielded many plants and vertebrates. This scene is based on fossils from a handful of Wellington Formation sites in the vicinity of Perry, Oklahoma. These sites record an estuarine locality; members of several major vertebrate clades are present.

The blue fishes are Platysomus striatus, a “palaeoniscoid” or basal actinopterygian (Actinopterygii include most living fishes, but was only a modest component of Permian ichthyofaunas). They are swimming about the submerged trunk of an early conifer washed in from the uplands.

In the lower right is the lungfish Gnathorhiza serratus; lungfishes were far more widespread and diverse in the Permian than they are today. It is poking beneath a forked frond of the probable seed-fern Gigantopteridium americanum.

At bottom center are two adults of the temnospondyl Trimerorhachis insignis. One individual is disgorging juveniles from its pharyngeal brood pouches; this is based on an individual found with tiny bones of the same species preserved in the region where its internal gills would have been.

Above the Trimerorhachis is the famous boomerang-headed nectridean Diplocaulus magnicornis. The function of its bizarre skull is still debated; various authors have suggested it improved its maneuverability while swimming, protected its gills, or kept it from being swallowed by predators.

Finally at top right we see an animal only known from Perry, the early diapsid reptile Dictybolos tener. Little has been published on this animal, though it is apparently known from many specimens. It is thought to have been a piscivore (its genus name means “fisherman”).

Seymouria sanjuanensis

Here’s another colored-pencil-on-colored-paper drawing; this time it’s a reconstruction of a long-extinct animal. Seymouria sanjuanensis was a tetrapod that lived during the early Permian period, more than 270 million years ago, long before the dinosaurs, pterosaurs, plesiosaurs, and other newcomers had arrived on the scene. It was a stocky little lizard-like creature about two feet long, similar in size and shape to the modern blue-tongued skinks. Its sturdy skeleton, with prominent attachment points for muscles, was adapted for terrestrial life. Its teeth were sharp; it likely preyed on the numerous insects and other arthropods that flourished in the Permian, and perhaps ate small vertebrates as well.

The major paleontological interest in Seymouria has been in its relationship to the amniotes (the vertebrate group that includes reptiles, birds, and mammals). Many paleontologists in the 20th century considered Seymouria a representative of the transition from the “amphibian” grade of tetrapods to the “reptile” grade. It was often treated as a sort of ur-reptile, from which the anatomies of early true reptiles and synapsids could be derive. More recent research indicates that Seymouria may not be closely related to amniotes at all, and that its similarities to them are independently acquired, perhaps due to the common constraints of terrestrial life.

A is for Amazon

I love classical mythology. And I love to draw! Also, I love illustrated alphabets. So I’m going to put the three together and make some mythological drawings – one for each letter of the (Roman) alphabet. As it turns out, the number of letters in the alphabet is the same as the number of fortnights in the year, so I’ll post a mythabetical drawing every two weeks.

Without further ado, here is the first installment: A is for Amazon. She’s still pretty sketchy; I’ll try to update with a more finished version later.

A is for Amazon

My conceit is that the heroic legends recorded in the classical era reflect, if sometimes in a dim or distorted way, real events that occurred during the Bronze Age, several centuries earlier. More specifically, I am linking the high point of the Heroic Age – the time of Herakles, Atalanta, Theseus, and Oidipous, of the voyage of the Argo and the hunt for the Kalydonian Boar – with the beginning of the Late Helladic period (about the time of the Shaft Graves at Mykenai). I suppose at some point I should write up a justification for this chronology, but that will have to wait. The main effect on the illustrations is that the costumes, weapons, and tools borne by the characters will be based on artifacts of that period in history.

The Amazones, a famous nation of female warriors, are often mentioned by the mythographers, but there is little consistency about their habits, history, or even homeland. Different authors place them in various part of Turkey, in “Libya” (in ancient geography, this term encompasses not just modern Libya but all of Africa west of the Nile Valley), or on the Ukrainian steppes. Several stories involve them transplanting from one of these areas to another.

I conceive of the (eastern) Amazones as a highly mobile tribe of nomadic herders who dwell in the interstices between more sedentary agricultural societies throughout the Pontic region and carry on a trading (and sometimes raiding) relationship with those societies while maintaining their cultural integrity, something like the Kura-Araxes culture of the Near East in a slightly earlier period, or the later Bedouins. I have not yet decided what, if any, relation exists between the eastern and Libyan Amazones. Maybe they are separate peoples conflated by later writers.

Classical artists typically represented Amazones as bearing the garb of Phrygian, Persian, or Scythian warriors – whichever eastern barbarians were currently in vogue – and nearly always in tall peaked caps. I’ve outfitted my Amazon in an ageless steppe costume, similar to but simpler than those of the later peoples listed above – belted tunic, breeches, sheepskin cape, high boots – with a fur-lined version of the tall cap.

Her weapons are based on those of the Srubnaya, or Timber-Grave, culture of Ukraine. This is not to imply that the Srubnaya culture should be identified with the Amazones; rather, I figure the nomadic Amazones would have limited metal-working equipment (too heavy for swift travel) and would not make their own bronze blades. Srubnaya foundries in central Ukraine supplied metal tools, weapons, and ornaments to tribes across a broad region of the steppes, and the Amazones (at least in the northern parts of their range) would have been able to trade for these weapons or take them as spoils when raiding other tribes.

Classical writers and artists associated Amazones with the battle-ax, even crediting them with its invention, so my Amazon bears one at her waist. She also carries the distinctive Srubnaya pierced “spear”, which would have been used more like a halberd (focus on chopping or slashing rather than stabbing). Hers has some horsetail tassels – Amazones were also closely associated with horses, and credited with inventing cavalry. I didn’t want to draw a horse, so let’s assume hers is grazing just past the edge of the picture. I also gave her a crescent moon brooch, in allusion to the ties between the Amazones and the moon-goddess Artemis.

Introduction

Howdy! My name is Nathan and I live in Music City USA – Nashville, Tennessee. I don’t make music, but I do draw, paint, and sculpt. My work is mostly representational and naturalistic, and my subject matter is mostly organic (animals, plants, and people) but I aim to branch out a bit.

It’s 2020, the Year of Seeing Clearly, and as part of my efforts to improve the clarity of my own vision, I’ve started a blog! I know, I’m a real trendsetter. In any case, this blog is a place for me to post my finished artwork and works-in-progress and talk about materials, method, subject matter, and so on. I hope you enjoy reading my ramblings and maybe even get some good out of them. My hope for myself is that writing the blog will improve my productivity and proficiency and force me to think a little more clearly about what I’m doing and why, and also sharpen my writing skills. To that end, if you have any criticism of my artwork or my writing, please don’t hesitate to let me know in the comments! Questions are likewise welcome, and I will answer them to the best of my ability.

Thanks for dropping by!