I was one of the judges of the 2022 BreyerFest Best Customs Contest. We were asked not to discuss our decisions with anyone, but especially not the entrants. My fellow judges and I took that seriously, but after it was said and done, I found myself standing in a restaurant parking lot with Jenn Constantine, whose excellent Fantasy entry had been one of the also rans.
"I loved your entry," I told her, "But that was an impossible division. Don't be discouraged. You're so close. Next year, bring it."
Or words to that effect.
If I'm being honest, that was a long week, and I have only the vaguest memory of this conversation. In fact, I'd forgotten it entirely until Jenn brought it up when I sent her a congratulatory note about her 2023 entry.
"I do believe," she said, "your instructions in the parking lot of the sushi place were: Bring it next year."
Well, I wish everyone listened to me like that!
Here's the story of Jenn's amazing 2023 Fantasy entry. This is the very definition of "bringing it."
The Making of Absinthe and Styx
by Jenn Constantine
Happy Halloween in June! What can I say… I am bone-ified nuts 🥲😈
“Absinthe & Styx” are my 2023 BCC Fantasy division entry.
Ever since painting the first Spook, I’ve fantasized about a full model, but wasn’t sure I had the technical skill to attempt one. So I did the only thing any proper and sane artist would do, tried anyways and did two of them.
The larger one, Absinthe, is a grand, old , malevolent spirit, but she watches over Styx with fierce love. She has un-bleached bones, moss and a green-tinted, fiery mane, shoulders and tail.
Styx is a punky colt, splashing joyfully in the water. He has darker, burned bones, and a a fiery orange mane, shoulders and tail.
No bones about it, I almost worked myself to death on them, but I tried to make the process as humerus as possible to keep up my spirits. Multiple times I called myself a numbskull and thought I didn’t have a leg to stand on. I marrowly escaped with my sanity, and I am bone tired. 
Nearly every bone was individually cut out of my starting models (Ballynoe Castle, Totilas and a Lipizzaner foal). Every rib, every vertebra… everything.
Then they went through more dremeling, stretching and shaping with a heat gun, sanding, comparing to scale references and more to become as anatomically correct as possible, then eventually wired together in the joints to turn back into a full skeleton.
Nearly everything you see is original plastic with some sculpted details.
One of the most fun things about the skelly bones was the texture... Bones have smooth shapes and lines, but a lot of their surface is quite rough for muscle attachment. This was my first test wash on parts of Absinthe to see how she was looking and I was really pleased with it
I am especially grateful to some specific sources of references, because this was a serious challenge without an actual skeleton on hand; Christine Jordan and her late, great mare Hannah for providing pictures of specific bone angles, Maria Hjerppe with her “Foals” reference book, and the many excellent anatomy/skeleton references and books compiled by Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig in her newsletters and blog. This would not have been possible without those resources, and I am deeply thankful.
I know I'm pushing at what the hobby tends to accept as fantasy, or even simply acceptable at all to some. What is art but personal expression of pushing boundaries and viewers mindsets? These two were a labor of both madness and love in multiple respects, and one of those had been my quiet personal challenge to become more death positive over the past few years. While I personally hold no beliefs in a specific afterlife or spirit world, my imagination has been flourishing there. I hope to share the beauty I see in bones. I'm especially touched that several people have shared that while this pair isn't their normal cuppa, they found something to appreciate or enjoy.
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