The Birth of Cthulhu
*** Prints available here: [link]

Do you know how sometimes you get strange ideas by looking at your surroundings and by associating things that have seemingly nothing in common? somehow, your creative Muse manages to invent something new with a bric-a-brac of objects, sounds, smells, colors or words.

I was trying to imagine how H.P.Lovecraft ever managed to invent such a massive universe and instead of deep and intensive researches in Libraries and Museums, why wouldn't he just put things together at the dinner table? Now imagine a scene where Howard is at home, eating some sea-food spaghetti while reading some encyclopedia on fish, bats and other magazines. Suddenly, a light bulb pops at about 100 watts and he puts it all together:

Squidhead + tentacles + batwings + fishbody = Cthulhu

The Magazines spell: Miss + Cat + ...tonic and he creates Miskatonic University. (He did have a cat called Felis)

He looks at the flowers he bought week and invents the sign of the Elders.

With Cthulhu in mind, he just had to take a look at that wonderful Greek beer called "Mythos" and there you have it, The Cthulhu Mythos.

His glass, for some reason, show the liquid at an angle, which is enough to spawn the "weird angle and extra dimensions" part of the universe.

On the bat book, to his right is written the following: (too small here, take my word for it):

"Dr. Pickman 555-1970"

An idea for a story: "the bats of Ulthar?" (it's written on a bat book, remember?)

There's a scribble le about Yog.hurt Sothoth

Then, "Alhaz" and a red stain (Alhazred)

And on the book to his left, behind the flowers are written the word DrAGON, with the R almost invisible and we all know that will turn into DAGON one day.

In addition, the aficionados might recognize a few things on the wall:

On the top left is H.P. as a kid, to the right his wife, Sonia Greene (aka Sonia H. Davis in her memoirs). Below is a famous painting of Goya's "Saturn eating his son" which is perfect for the strangeness and horror aspect. The building to the left is Butler Hospital, where it seems H.P.'s mother spent some time. It is in Providence, RI.

Under that is either a painting or a mirror (you decide) that shows the back of H.P. and a reflection of a strange Cthulhu-like character looking at him.
On the other side is a personal wink, as it is a small version of my The Giant Cthulhu painting.

If you look well on both side, in the drapery, you can see the eyes and scales of a couple of monsters. On the bottom left corner of Sonia Greene's frame, there's also a monster to be seen. The inside of the drapery, the white part, is also turning into tentacles. The piece of paper on the left-hand book (entitled R'lyeh, by the way) and the other piece of paper behind the bottle of beer are both original drawings and sketches from H.P.Lovecraft.

The clock has also a role to play: First, the date under the clock is June 18, 1925 or Summer 1925, which seems to be the time H.P. started working on the Cthulhu Mythos.

On HPL's tomb, one can read "I am Providence". On the clock, on can read 1 O'clock, or "1 am", and under is "Providence, RI"

Now, if you write down "1 am Providence", you get something very close to the line on the tombstone.

*** Prints available here: [link]