Since 1975, I have worked almost exclusively in acrylics, but I still love to paint in oils. Not long before doing this cover, I moved to a new studio that was larger and better organized than my old one, and it provided me with a space for an easel and taboret just for oils. I could have each medium in its own area to save time switching my whole setup from one to the other.

After a ten-year hiatus, I did three oil paintings. NIOBE is the second one. She is attended by her chief attributes, a spindle and scissors with the symbolic Death's head in the pattern, and is seen measuring a glowing "Thread of Life."