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High up in the jungle trees, our warrior heroine is fighting a predatory Kaprosuchus, a terrestrial relative of crocodiles and alligators. (In real life, Kaprosuchus would have lived in Africa around 100 million years ago, during the mid-Cretaceous Period. But this is of course a fun fantasy picture.)
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If any single animal deserves to be called “king of the jungle”, it is probably the tiger rather than the lion. After all, unlike lions, tigers actually do live in jungles (though their range also extends to grasslands and temperate forests elsewhere in Asia).
Anyway, it was the Netflix documentary series Tiger King that inspired me to draw this. The show was unfortunately more interested in the human drama than anything else, but the poor animals are the real victims in that mess.
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This character would be the high priestess in a fantasy culture that venerates the Tyrannosaurus rex as a godlike symbol of power, much as cultures in our world have venerated apex predators such as the jaguar or lion. Trust me, you don’t want to have that sacrificial knife of hers going through you!
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This would be a spunky warrior princess from ancient Kush, drawn with the physical proportions of an animated Disney princess. There actually is a Disney stage musical called Aida with a Kushite princess as the title character, but it’s more of a tragic love story than anything else and I don’t think she is a warrior like my character here.
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Bistahieversor sealeyi was a meat-eating dinosaur of the tyrannosaurid family that would have hunted in what is now New Mexico around 74.5 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous Period. With a weight in excess of three tons and a body length approaching thirty feet, it would have been a fairly large predator, albeit significantly smaller than the famous T. rex. Of course, the hide pattern I gave this animal is inspired by the modern jaguar.
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This woman would be a Queen of the Mangbetu, a Central African people who established a number of kingdoms in what is now the northeastern Democratic Republic of the Kongo during the 18th century AD. I realize her pet leopard is quite large and heavily built for its species, but I needed the queen’s hand to be able to reach down to its shoulder while she was standing.
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I had this weird dream in which I caught the COVID-19 coronavirus. Inside of me was this miniature city of cells like the one in the early 2000’s animated film Osmosis Jones, and the virus took on the form of this anthropomorphic, rather curvaceous villainess with a seductive African-American accent. Think of her as being a female equivalent to Thrax from that movie.
For real, though, be sure to stay safe and healthy in these troubled times!
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If you look across this forest clearing in Late Cretaceous North America, circa 66 million years ago, you can see a pair of Triceratops milling about. Some inspiration for this composition came from the work of paleoartist Douglas Henderson, who excels in creating lush environments for his dinosaurs to dwell in.
This would be another piece of concept art for Itaweret, a strong-willed priestess of Kemetian (ancient Egyptian) descent who is the protagonist of my upcoming alternate history/fantasy novel "Priestess of the Lost Colony". To sum up her story without spoiling anything, Itaweret hails from a Kemetian colony called Per-Pehu on the coast of Greece, and she must liberate her people from enslavement after the warlike Mycenaeans sack her hometown. I've already finished and done a few revisions for the novel's first draft, so it should be ready for publication soon!
This is cel-shaded concept art for two more characters from my upcoming alternate history/fantasy novel "Priestess of the Lost Colony". The young man would be Philos, an Achaean (Bronze Age Greek) shepherd boy who volunteers to help the Kemetian (ancient Egyptian) priestess Itaweret on her quest (and has the hots for her, although these sentiments start out unrequited since she sees his people as primitive and barbaric). He has as his companion a tame lion named Xiphos, whose faint spots are an atavistic throwback to the prehistoric European "cave lions" with whom his ancestors interbred.
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Raised by gorillas deep in the rainforest of Central Africa, this woman will fight to the death to defend her adoptive family and their homeland.
The biggest challenge in creating this was getting the gorillas’ anatomy as accurate as possible. Their overall anatomy is similar to that of human beings (they are our closest relatives after chimpanzees and bonobos, after all), yet they differ from us in their proportions and postures.
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Today I found out that an academic publication titled "Orientalism and the Reception of Powerful Women from the Ancient World" cited my old DeviantArt page as a source! I got to say I'm very honored to have attracted such attention from the academic community!
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On a spooky night under a full moon, this poor young woman is experiencing a transformation of prehistoric proportions. Such is the price to pay for going out on the Night of the Were-Saurus!
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This fierce, watchful warrior mermaid would be based on the Zulu culture of South Africa. The bottom half of her body is that of a great white shark, like those that hunt the Cape fur seals along the South African coastline.
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The crocodyliforms of Cretaceous Africa are not all that impressed with Spinosaurus aegyptiacus’s aquatic adaptations.
Seriously, Spinosaurus these days is starting to look less like a typical theropod dinosaur and more like a big croc with a sail. Ah well, that’s science marching on for you.
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These two would be soldiers from opposite sides of the American Civil War (1861-1865), one of the bloodiest wars ever fought in the history of the United States of America. My favorite part of drawing this was differentiating the two soldiers through their emotional expressions in addition to the obvious contrast in uniform color. I feel it helps represent the causes each side fought for.
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This is a book cover I designed for my recently completed alternate history/fantasy novel "Priestess of the Lost Colony", using various pieces of concept art I created for the characters and story. The woman in the middle of the composition is my protagonist Itaweret, an Egyptian priestess, and the two guys behind her are her brother Bek (right) and the Greek shepherd boy Philos (left). The city at the bottom is the titular Egyptian colony of Per-Pehu on the Greek coast.
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After partaking in a battle out in the rocky desert, an Egyptian warrior brandishes his blood-stained khopesh while roaring out his victory cry.
I saw a short documentary on Youtube about forging a khopesh sword like those used by the ancient Egyptians, and it made me want to draw this scene. At the video’s 8:32 time mark, they actually featured one of my earlier drawings, which I found very flattering!
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This would be a little piece of concept art for a "cowgirl" sort of character from the Old West. I think I will call her Plano Penelope, in honor of the suburban town of Plano in Texas where I went to kindergarten.
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These two characters of mine would be a two-woman team of bounty huntresses who operate throughout the American West during the 1870s. The African-American woman to the left goes by the nickname Plano Penelope (real name Penelope Jenkins) whereas the Native American woman to the right is her Wichita partner Dawn Beaver.
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150 million years ago, Allosaurus fragilis surveys its hunting grounds atop some rocky outcroppings on the Jurassic savanna. This was something I created to unwind after a particularly rough week in an already rough year.
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This is my contribution to that “Sailor Moon redraw” fad that was buzzing on social media in late May of 2020. Of course, I had to make my take on Sailor Moon look more Japanese than the character’s original “Nordic”-looking design, since she is from Japanese cartoons.
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Every so often, I draw a portrait of a woman and wonder what to do with her. Who is she, and where is she from? What culture and time period might she represent? Questions like those inform what sort of attire I give her. This time, however, I decided to leave my subject without any clothing, jewelry, or hairstyle that might identify her with any particular time or place, or link her with any group of people. She could be anyone from anywhere and any time. She is, simply, beauty unadorned.
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100,000 years ago off the coast of South Africa, a daring early human huntress (Homo sapiens) confronts a great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) which has been menacing her shoreline community.
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At the dawn of humanity, an early artist paints an image of the creator deity she believes him. Some say that humanity was created in the image of God, but perhaps instead it was humanity that created God in our own image?
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This is a colored-pencil portrait of a young prehistoric woman. She could be from any period of human prehistory, but I was thinking of the earliest days of the modern human species (Homo sapiens) around 300,000 years ago.
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This is my take on the iconic and oft-parodied “March of Progress” illustration depicting human evolution. You might have noticed that most replications of this sequence use male subjects to represent each species, so I thought it only fair to show the other, female half of this evolutionary journey for my version.
From left to right, the species shown are Australopithecus afarensis, Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and Homo sapiens (our species).
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This would be a portrait of a random princess or other female nobility from ancient Egypt. Those dreadlocks she’s wearing may not necessarily be her natural hair, as it was customary for upper-class Egyptians to shave their heads and wear wigs as a sign of status (and to protect their natural hair from head lice).
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This drawing depicts my concept for a hypothetical hominin species that would be descended from Homo heidelbergensis, the common ancestor of Neanderthals, Denisovans, and modern humans. They would be more closely related to the Neanderthal and Denisovan lineage than to ours, but they would have stayed behind in Africa while the Neanderthals and Denisovans colonized Eurasia. Think of them as being like an African version of Neanderthals.
As such, they would be physically stronger and have a more carnivorous diet than us, rather like their Neanderthal and Denisovan kin, but they wouldn’t be as well-adapted to cold climates as the latter.
(This is not a real species that has been discovered, mind you, just a speculative one from my imagination.)
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This is concept art for a character named Oja, the protagonist of an upcoming story of mine set in eastern Africa around 100,000 years ago. She is the intended heir to the chieftainship of Ori Zam, her native village, but her brash desire to make herself worthy of that status often gets her into trouble. When her antics get her inheritance taken away from her, Oja must find a new home and a new purpose in the treacherous world her people inhabit.
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Here's another concept art for Oja of Ori Zam, the protagonist of a story I've been working on that is set in Africa around 100,000 years ago. This was a surprisingly difficult pose for me to draw, as it took three tries to get it to look the way I wanted.
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These would be two supporting characters from my story about Oja of Ori Zam, which is set in prehistoric Africa around 100,000 years ago. From left to right, they are Uru and Namak, and both of them are Oja’s lifelong best friends. Generally speaking, Uru is the most level-headed and diplomatic of the three, whereas Namak is the most aggressive.
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In North America around 66 million years ago, a solitary bull Alamosaurus sanjuanensis holds his long neck high in search of a potential mate. Alamosaurus would have been the last of the giant sauropod dinosaurs to roam the North American continent, living at approximately the same time as the famous Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops.
By the way, the scenery for this artwork was inspired by a viewing of the movie Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, specifically the scenes set on Isla Nublar during the first act.
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An ancient Egyptian woman receives a visit from a winged cobra spirit, possibly the goddess Wadjet, and kneels before her in reverence.
I originally intended this artwork to go on a face mask which I would sell on Redbubble, but I had trouble getting the whole design to fit on the mask. Nonetheless, I’m rather proud of my emulation of the Egyptian artistic style here.
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This portrait depicts a modern Muslim woman of African descent in a traditional hijab. Although it originated in Arabia, Islam spread into Africa shortly afterward in the 7th century AD. In modern times, nearly one third of the world’s Muslims live in Africa, where they constitute about forty percent of the population. In some African cultures, Islam has been syncretized with indigenous religions to the point where people may practice both Islamic and native customs.
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This would be a face mask design modeled after the bone-crushing jaws of Tyrannosaurus rex. The tiny bumps you can see on its face are sensory organs similar to those on modern crocodiles and alligators, which are the closest living relatives to dinosaurs like T. rex (after birds, of course).
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It's Throwback Thursday again! This is a drawing I did on 11×17” Bristol paper back in 2018, which depicts the ruins of a lost civilization deep in the rainforests of Central Africa’s Congo Basin. The civilization in question is my fictional invention, of course, but I imagine it would have been built ~3,000 years ago by a Bantu-speaking people who had commercial and cultural links with the ancient Egyptians and Kushites.
By the way, that big gemstone atop the obelisk near the upper left corner is supposed to be a really big diamond.
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This is a commissioned artwork starring one of the Barbary corsairs, North African pirates who terrorized the Atlantic and Mediterranean between the 16th and 19th centuries AD. They're most infamous for enslaving large numbers of European Christian captives, though they would also prey on Jews as well as "pagan" peoples of coastal West Africa. They even got into a couple of fights with the United States under Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in the early 19th century.
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“Come, thou mortal wretch, With thy sharp teeth this knot intrinsicate Of life at once untie: poor venomous fool, Be angry, and dispatch. O, couldst thou speak, That I might hear thee call great Caesar Ass Unpolicied!”
—Cleopatra VII, Queen of Ptolemaic Egypt (69-30 BC), as quoted from Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra
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This is a pencil drawing of a hoplite (soldier) from ancient Sparta, which is probably the most famous of the classical Greek city-states after Athens. The Spartans’ reputation for military prowess and courage has endured to the present day, but while the film 300 portrayed them as fighting on behalf of freedom and justice, they in fact developed their entire gung-ho warrior culture to keep their enslaved population (known as the helots) in line.
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This portrait shows a male specimen of Homo naledi, a hominin species which lived in southern Africa between 335,000 and 236,000 years ago. It would have been contemporaneous with some of the earliest modern humans (Homo sapiens), but Homo naledi itself had a number of “primitive” characteristics such as an apelike face and a hand morphology adapted to climbing trees (although its feet were more like those of a typical bipedal hominin). Therefore, I went with a more apelike take in depicting this species, but I gave it kinky “Afro” hair to represent its close evolutionary affinity with modern human beings.
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This is my portrait of Dilophosaurus wetherilli, a meat-eating theropod dinosaur that hunted in North America 193 million years ago during the Early Jurassic Period. Contrary to certain cinematic portrayals, there is no evidence that Dilophosaurus could spit venom or had an expandable frill. What it did have were powerful jaw muscles that would have helped it kill its prey, which may have included fish and other aquatic organisms as well as other dinosaurs.
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This is Oja, my prehistoric heroine character, drawn in another cartoony style. This time, the stylistic inspiration came from the work of animator Vivienne Medrano (aka "VivziePop"), who is behind the online cartoon "Hazbin Hotel".
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This is my portrait of Athena, the ancient Greek goddess of wisdom and warfare. She makes an appearance in my upcoming novel "Priestess of the Lost Colony", wherein she aids the main antagonists by spying on our heroes in owl form. In Greek literature such as the Odyssey, she was repeatedly described as having gray eyes, which I interpreted here as a luminous silver to give her that supernatural quality.
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This giant snake wants to challenge the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex for the title of Late Cretaceous apex predator. Personally, my money is on the dinosaur, but you have to admire the serpent’s gumption here.
The snake isn’t based on any particular fossil taxon, but I wouldn’t be too surprised if something like it were to be found in Mesozoic sediments someday. We already know some crocodiles and their relatives, such as Deinosuchus and Sarcosuchus, grew big enough to prey on dinosaurs. Why not snakes as well?
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Hypatia of Alexandria (370-415 AD) was a female philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer who worked and lectured at the University of Alexandria in Egypt (then a province of the Eastern Roman Empire). Despite the misogynistic prejudices that prevailed during her time, she nonetheless won respect as a brilliant academic by her contemporaries as well as later historians.
Unfortunately this did not save her from the wrath of fanatical Christian monks who had her dragged by her chariot down the street, stripped naked, beaten to death, and then burned. Some historians believe that Hypatia’s death marked a tragic end not only for a woman of her intellect but for the intellectual tradition of science and philosophy which she represented, hence while it has been called “the end of classical antiquity”.
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