Title: Night Bird (The Guardian)
Artist: Dan Dwayne Spencer
Media: Polychrome Pencils & Graphite
I've always thought of owls as the protector types. It' somehow comforting to think that you have a guardian watching over you. I started this drawing after attending the Texas Tech satellite campus at Junction Texas. It is (or was at the time) a campus for grad students working on their master's degrees. It's located in a beautiful and peaceful bend of the river. Lots of trees and grasses grow up along it's shores. Well, as I said I got it started and the owl was almost finished when I lost motivation. I used the unfinished picture as a classroom example showing how to use the media but I just couldn't find the drive to finish it. Then one day I was looking back through old photos and ran across some I had taken that summer when I was attending grad school there at Junction campus. I got out the old owl and I could finally see what had been eluding me. What it had been all along, but I just couldn't see it. The trees and the river. The Moon Spirit reflecting in the glossy water. His braids becoming owl feathers as the water flowed. In my book "The Secret King & Poetry of Praise," Joseph tells Naaman that he has always thought of him as the protector type. Indeed he must be persuaded to protect the Secret King but he comes through and his belief in the Hebrew God is solidified.
