ORIGINAL AVAILABLE: “Ill-Begotten Reward” 24x18 Oil on Panel 2025.

Summoner and Scribe Series 4 of 9. 

This painting comes framed! (US orders only please, but…prints always ship worldwide)

Summoner and Scribe,” tells the story of Benj, a melancholy young lad who gives up on his dream of being an author of children’s tragedies to take a good-paying but unsatisfying job as a scribe for a Master Occultist…who specializes in the summoning of demons.

Here, we see Erie Oldfather paying Benj the promised gold and treasures for his scribe work—for penning a grimoire of demonic occult lore, sinister spells, and dirty jokes. Benj doesn’t feel very good about bringing the diabolical text into the world and wishes he would be paid for his melodic, creative writings instead. As uneasy as Benj feels, he can provide for himself and his wife, Dovie, who sadly was blinded after drinking too much coffee (a cautionary tale in itself!).     

In the painting, I wanted to capture Benj’s internal conflict by showing his wife Dovie through the odd cutaway and off-perspective of the house. I wanted to show their couple’s melancholy financial situation through the dark blue-gray colors they are wearing.

The “Summoner and Scribe” series is inspired by the idea of setting aside one’s dreams or choosing a good-paying career over a creative and fulfilling one. Artistic pursuits vs financial security. Personally, being an artist is VERY hard and VERY demanding, and sometimes I consider doing something that pays better, like computer programming. Morally, I feel that painting--even painting demons--is pure, whereas I might feel some reservations about spending my life working with computers. …it’s very tempting though. I used to bartend, and I felt this way all the time.  

This painting took about 80 hours make and is sure to grant you magickal success in whichever life path you choose!