David and Goliath - Illustrations from the Bible

After many years of "dues-paying" my bride and I decided that if we ever actually achieved financial success and owned our own home, we would grace our mantel with an awesome painting of David getting ready to beat Goliath, as we felt that it represented us overcoming the huge obstacles that were against us in our life. We had many favorite artists, but as we got ready to commission the work, we didn't feel that many could bring the intensity we wanted.

My wife saw Bisley's "Ascension" painting at the SDCC, showed me, and we knew who we wanted. We approached Simon, who seemed very surprised that A: we saw the painting, and B: we loved it. He said he was much too busy, but took our number anyway. Three months later, a call from England, a week after that, a preliminary pencil via email, a month later our painting arrived (a week before Christmas - best present ever).

Unknown to us, a collector was already commissioning many other Bible-based works from Simon (mostly detailed pencils, but a few paintings too), and Simon said that our enthusiasm helped him decide to publish them all in "Simon Bisley's Illustrations from the Bible".

The painting is acrylic on board, and measures almost 2x3 feet!
(sorry to ramble on, but I always liked hearing how certain works came about, and figured you might too)