A lush, painterly jungle scene rendered almost entirely in greens - moss, foliage and dappled canopy light layered in loose, atmospheric brushwork behind a single striking figure. A dark-haired jungle woman crouches low on a rock outcrop, knife gripped in one hand, her body coiled protectively between the viewer and two tigers resting just below her - one snarling with bared teeth, the other calm and watchful. Her pose and the surrounding vegetation are built from soft, blended colour rather than hard linework, giving the whole piece a hazy, almost dreamlike quality that contrasts with the sharp glint of the blade and the tigers' teeth and claws. This is classic pulp-adventure pin-up territory, and it sits comfortably alongside the painters who most shaped Bisley's own style - he has cited Frank Frazetta, along with artists as varied as Gustav Klimt, Salvador Dali, Richard Corben, Bill Sienkiewicz and Egon Schiele, as key influences, and the jungle-guardian archetype seen here, a lone human figure holding dominion over powerful animals through nerve rather than force, runs straight back to the Frazetta tradition of adventure-fantasy painting that fantasy illustrators of Bisley's generation grew up on. It's a quieter, more atmospheric piece than much of his monster-fighting work, trading violent action for a held moment of tension - predator and protector sharing the same rock, neither one moving first.
Two tigers and a naked jungle girl
