This piece was inspired by the writing of one of the people I regularly play D&D with. He recently created his own setting for a campaign and the description of the city was immediately inspiring.
The city sits atop a huge stone cliff that has been carved into the form of a roaring lion, a series of towers encircle the peak of the statue each capped with a shining gold plated roof giving the statue a golden crown. The mouth of the lion is open wide in mid roar and the inside has been carved out to serve as the cities sheltered dock.
I took on the challenge of painting this landscape through a desire to attempt to paint water, clouds and stone. These materials are always fascinating textures to draw so I wanted to attempt to capture the feeling of the environment and the scale of the carved lion’s head through the detail of the stone texture.