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For many years it has been rumored within the fine art world that artist Bartholomew Dade of ‘How Eloquent’ fame, had painted a small collection of works featuring Medusa. Dade was known for his decadent, rich, and regal subjects of work so it struck art collectors odd that on his death bed he mentioned these previously unreleased works of a dark, unpleasant, and mythological nature.

Medusa was a figure in Greek mythology that was one of the gorgon sisters who had snakes for hair and turned all that looked upon her to stone.

Rumors were laid to rest last Friday when Marshall Cosgrove was helping clear out some old family heirlooms and treasures from the attic of Le Theater, the neoclassical venue in downtown Scandalica City that has been owned by the Cosgrove Family since its construction in 1893.

Among dusty statues, old theater chairs, and other canvases, Marshall didn’t know at first that the paintings he stumbled upon were from Dade himself.

“I thought they were just something someone in my family had picked up at an auction years ago,” he admitted. “I mean, there was so much art stashed up there, I am surprised I even took notice of these—but something seemed special about them.”

In a smart move, the lad asked his parents about the Medusa paintings before putting them out to be sold.

Adriana Cosgrove, who majored in art in college knew at once that the paintings were not replicas and not just*any*Medusas.

“My Husband wouldn’t have known a Manet from a Monet but Dade’s Medusas have been a subject of speculation for years, no one could prove that they existed and I am amazed they were real and ended up right under our noses—it’s quite exciting,” Mrs. Cosgrove explained.

Perhaps not so surprising when one takes a look at art history.

Delilah Piper, the Kashmire Reigon’s foremost art historian has ties to the Cosgrove family and explains the coincidence thusly, “My great-great-grandfather, Alphonse Cosgrove, was a diplomat for the region at the same time Bartholomew Dade visited the nation for the first time. Dade had saved enough to work in a studio right here in the region but it was before he entered his ‘Regal period’ of which he most famous for."

Records indicate that Alphonse received a collection of art but there was no name or titles that went on these records.

Piper continued with, “Perhaps Dade had given them to my great-great-grandfather as a gift of goodwill or he didn’t think they were good enough to display. However I suspect the reason they went unnoticed for so long was because no one in the family ever mentioned them. They were never displayed in any of our homes or businesses.”

There are no official titles for each single work of Dade’s Medusas, however you can barely make out the artist’s signature near the bottom, and dates of 1901. The Cosgroves had art experts examine and confirm the paintings as authentic before announcing the art had been discovered.

One of the canvases depicts a crying woman with snakes for hair, and nearly empty eyes despite a clear look of pain. The other is a forward looking version of Medusa with barely any color, but interestingly there are flowers between the snakes.

Why do the Medusa’s fascinate collectors so much after all these years?

“They have a gruesome beauty,” mused Gene MacKenzie, an art critic and painter himself. “As you know, Dade was crushingly alone in his younger years; his parents died and he lived on the streets of Simola—I can see these as his escape into the fantastical but illustrating the shadows he still held in his heart.”

“He was reaching for happiness,” MacKenzie notes, pointing out the flowers and scant color, then gesturing to the crying Medusa “Here there is none.”

As for the fate of these works, they shall not be put up for auction just for a possibly be put away again for another century. This has caused a dispute among some of the artistic society.

“Our family has donated them to the Memosa Bay Metro Museum of Art—to the permanent collection,” Adriana insisted, “This art is priceless, and it’s been a good mystery for the greater part of 100 years after Dade’s death. I suspect many will want to view art that has become so legendary.”

Like Medusa’s hair, these works have slithered their way back into public consciousness and the art-going public couldn’t be happier.

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