The Robber Bridegroom

The semester is over! Well...almost...I only have one more final to complete. This semester I took "Advanced Illustration" which was awesome because we got to choose all of our own assignments. This helped because I was able to start building my portfolio with the type of work I want. This is one of the final pieces for that class:

The Robber Bridegroom

This is a fantastic Grimm Fairy tale, but let me warn you it is not for the squeamish or faint of heart. 

A young woman is betrothed to a man she barely knows. For some reason she feels nervous of the man, not fully trusting him. Through their engagement he continually tries to get her to come to his house but she always refuses. One day he tells her she has to come because he is throwing a party for her for the wedding. She says she doesn't know where he lives.

"In the middle of the dark forest" says the man.

"I will get lost" she says.

"There will be a trail of ashes you can follow to find my house"

That night, alone, the girl goes into the forest and follows the trail of ashes to his house. But there is no party there: in  fact the place is empty. She steps inside to look around. A bird is trapped in a cage hanging from the ceiling and he tells her to get out, she's in a murderers house! The girl ignores the birds numerous warnings and continues searching. She looks in the cellar and finds an old woman there who informs her that her betrothed is a murderer and he's planning on killing her! The old woman hides the girl behind some barrels and the betrothed and his friends come home drunk, with a young girl screaming in their grasp. 

They throw the girl on the table, kill her, and then eat her. One man chops off her little finger (b.c he can't get the ring off that is stuck there). The finger flies behind the barrels and into the girls lap. The men fall into a drunken sleep and the old woman and the girl escape. The next night at their wedding, it is customary for everyone to tell a story. The groom encourages the girl to tell a story. So she retells the story about the groom (all the while he's getting more and more nervous). Finally she pulls the finger out and proves the truth of the story. The guests attack the groom and give him justice.

This story is a dark one, but I really like it. Here is the piece I did as the girl first enters the dark forest