The forest is a college; Each tree, a university

This was very much not on my schedule for this spring. It unexpectedly caught my fancy, and I followed where that enthusiasm led. At first I decided to paint it just for something different, and because I had recently received the figure as a thank you for donating my halfling steam tank to a charity auction. Once I got to looking at it, I became more and more interested in the piece, and was quite interesting in finishing it.

I really like that this is far less anthropomorphic than most tree-man figures out there. The lack of a face is particularly effective. I hadn't really realized it until confronted with this figure, but the attempts to put a humanoid face on a tree is actually a large part of why I have been dis-satisfied with many other treeman figures I've seen. This one manages to really seem like a forest creature or a woodland elemental, and a lot less like a man in a tree suit.

All the more impressive when you realize the sculptor, one Jeremy Wright, is not a professional at this. While I don't think this was his first attempt at slinging putty, I'm pretty sure it is a fairly early effort from him. I look forward to more interesting work from him, if this is an indication of what he can do.