The Pilgrym: First Congregation Member of the Church of the Red Athenæum

The only cure is dying.

Having painted Samael the Church’s Chronicler, and the first two members of the Order of the Crimson Hour, I decided that it was time to paint one of the regular members of the congregation (which happens to be the only one that I have built thus far).  I wanted the regular members to fit naturally beside the ranking officials and the fighting order of the Church, but I also wanted them to be more subdued and impoverished looking,  with a focus on drab earthy colors.  And so, Matthias Stillman was born.

I made his robes a simple brown to distance him from the Order's cream colored robes, and the Chronicler's red ones.

I made special effort to add blood to his robes, and to have it spotting the floor tiles.

To accomplish this humble, almost destitute look, I started with his robes.  Stillman is a person of faith who does not concern himself with material things; the simplest functional things would do.  This line of thinking led me to painting his robe a spartan and frugal brown.  I extended this by giving him some mundane leather pouches, and a plain black glove.  The only concession to modesty was making his armored torso a deep crimson, to fit with the Church’s obsession with the color.

I painted a stylized hourglass on his dagger sheath, the symbol of the Church.

One more to join the ranks!

Matthias takes his devotion to the God-Emperor very seriously, something that is evident with his freshly dripping wounds and gore spattered robes.  He has long given up the luxury of sight, and recently even relinquished his voice, letting His teachings flow from his mouth, inscribed on parchment.


-Adam Wier