They say “a picture is worth a thousand words” But what about a life?
A little disclaimer before you start reading:
This episode contains descriptions of death & paranormal incidents. Viewer discretion is advised! So If it’s something you’re uncomfortable with, then this episode is not for you
There have been several haunted paintings that have been proven to have paranormal phenomena surrounding them. These events that occur around them are so eerie and disturbing it’s a wonder anyone ever owned them at all.
If you have any paintings in your house, did you ever think where they came from?
without further a due here are the 10 haunted paintings with creepy back stories
#10 Untitled
Just one in a series of paintings about death by Polish artist Zdzislaw Beksinski an expert in the art of dystopian surrealism
Dystopian Surrealism is a form of art that focuses on the liberation of the subconscious. Where the artist combines a nightmarish ambient with scenes of grotesque, horror, death, anxiety, and decay.
This untitled piece seems like something right out of a nightmare both visually and how being around it makes people feel.
It is believed that the painter’s obsession with death seemed to draw it directly to him. He lost his wife in 1998 to cancer and his own son to suicide only a year later. Then in 2005, he was found dead in his own apartment after he refused to lend a 19-year-old boy that he knew money which resulted in the teenager stabbing him to death.
Today, the ghostly artwork is said to give off an eerie feeling and many believe that looking at it too long will bring the viewer an unhealthy dose of death as well
#9 Soul Bowl
After finding an interesting painting of a bowl in an antique shop in Pauanui, New Zealand. A person identified only by their username Heylin bought it a brought it home. Soon after purchasing it, he found on the side of the canvas an inscription that says “The Shape of My Soul is a Bowl”
It wasn’t long before he felt that perhaps the writing was meant as a warning.
After it was hung in their home the painting fell off the wall even though there was no wind entering the room and nothing touched it. A short time later, their family was outside the house when they spotted a dark figure standing in the room that the painting was in.
Upon investigation, they discovered that there was nobody in their home at all!
Things eventually became so terrifying that Haylin was forced to auction it off and get out of the house.
The starting price for the “Haunted paintings” was $40.
#8 The Stagecraft
In 1994, commercial photographer James Kidd took a photograph of an old stagecoach top in Tombstone, Arizona. When he developed the photo, he was shocked to discover that standing beside the wagon in the frame was what appeared to be a headless man
Recreating the picture, the stagecraft was painted by a woman named Laura P. Who claimed to feel very strange while making it. The aritst said “When I was about halfway through completing the painting, I started getting a strange feeling. I began to ask myself: Why on earth did I want to paint this picture? And maybe I should never have started it.”
She gave it to a friend t an office, but soon after she got complaints that the painting seemed to move on its own and papers kept disappearing from people’s desks. Laura took the painting back and hung it in her own home, but the ghost came with it. Glasses broke, ornaments sailed off walls, and leaks appeared with no apparent cause and all in places near the painting.
(more about Stagecraft here)
#7 Love Letters Replica
In April 1887, 4 year old Samantha Houston (The daughter of a united states senator) was playing with a ball near the grand staircase in the Driscoll hotel in Austin Texas.
When she lost her footing, fell down the stairs and tragically died. It’s said that her ghost still haunts a portrait that hangs there called “Love Letters Replica”
The painting is of a little girl, the subject though isn’t actually Samantha. It’s a replica of another portrait by artist Richard king
Still it’s believed it’s Samantha’s spirit that haunts it! Guests and staff at the hotel have reported becoming nauseous and feeling like they are being lifted into the air when standing infront of it. Some even claim they have seen the girl’s expression slowly change as if she is attempting to communicate with them from the afterlife.
#6 “The Rain Woman”
Art is made to inspire certain feelings in those who take it in. But when there is something in that art makes you feel terrible then maybe there is something to it beyond the artist’s intentions.
Painted by Ukrainian artist Svetlana Telets; The Rain Woman has a history of making people feel SO uncomfortable they return it soon after purchasing it.
Most claiming that it made them unable to sleep.
According to Telets, the portrait which depicts a pale woman with a long neck standing in the rain while wearing all black actually painted itself. The artist finished the entire thing in just five hours and the whole time her hand was being guided by something unseen. Still today, those who spend time around it become severely uncomfortable and many complain about feeling sad or even being watched by something that they cannot see.
It now hangs in the Vinnytsia salon “Merckx-furniture” on the streets of Kiev. Customers who visit the shop today claim that sometimes you can catch the painting smiling and to some there is often a glance of anger.
(More about The Rain Woman here)
#5 “The Portrait of Bernardo De Galvez”
Located in Galveston, Texas, the Galvez Hotel is named after the famous Spanish Military leader Bernardo De Galvez and it is home to a portrait of the same man that is considered one of the most haunted paintings on EARTH! Paranormal events involving the portrait occur so frequently that many guests have accused the hotel staff of pulling off some sort of elaborate prank.
Galvez’s eyes seem to move on their own in the painting, sometimes following the guests who pass by it. Those who remain close to it for an extended period suddenly become cold and tense as if fear has taken a hold of them. They say if you want to take a picture of the portrait you have to ask Glavez for permission first otherwise he will interfere and your photo will come out blurry
(More about The Portrait of Bernardo De Galvez here)
#4 “The Dead Mother”
Artist Edvard Munch is best known for his famous painting “The Scream” He created another less famous but arguable much creepier painting. One which seems to affect all who stare at it for any length of time. Completed between 1899 and 1900.
The dead mother depicts a young child covering her ears while her mother lays in a bed behind her clearly dead and surrounded by mourners.
Legend has it that many people who chanced a look at this cursed painting began screaming uncontrollably terrified of something unseen coming from the painting. Those who don’t lose their minds are said to feel a cold shiver run through them or even hear the picture’s bedsheets rustling softly as if the mother is getting up to ensure that they are afraid
#3 “The Hands Resist Him”
Painted by Bill Stoneham in 1972, The Hands Resist Him is a painting that has another name that many of those who believe in its legend, call the haunted eBay Painting. The artwork depicts a young boy and a life-sized doll both standing in a doorway in front of a dark glass window that has a number of hands reaching forward as if trying to grab them.
In February of 2000, a couple from California put the painting up on eBay with the claim that it was haunted by something truly evil. At night, it’s said that the boy who is allegedly scared of the doll next to him, exits the canvas into whatever room the painting is displayed in. In addition, the owner of the first gallery that it was in, plus the first art critic to review it, both died the same year that they laid eyes on it. Definitely not a painting you want in your home…
#2 “The Crying Boy”
In the 1950s artist, Giovanni Bragolin (also known as Bruno Amadio) created a series of haunted paintings that included one of the strangest, most eerie portraits ever; titled “The crying boy”
The series literally consists of paintings of young children crying, these paintings appear to draw severe misfortune to whoever hangs them in their home.
Devastating house fires occurred in these homes (not only with the original paintings but many of the copies that have been made of them as well).
And in all of them, the portraits somehow ALWAYS survive even when the entire room around it turned to ashes.
In 1985, a story in the SUN a tabloid paper in the UK revealed the curse of the crying children haunted paintings is nothing but a myth, and their popularity plummeted.
However, the curse is said to remain with those that are still hanging on the walls
#1 “The Anguished Man”
Not a lot is known about this painting before it came into the possession of a woman from northern England around 1985. When she passed away, the artwork was left to her grandson Sean Robertson who pieced together what he could about it.
Mostly from his grandmother’s stories of it being evil. Robertson found that the unidentified artist behind the painting “The Anguished Man” used his own blood to create it and committed suicide after finishing it.
Shortly after in passed to Sean, his family started experiencing strange occurrences. Cries and moans can be heard coming from the painting and a dark figure was spotted on multiple occasions staring at them before vanishing. Videos were also captured of the painting moving on its own making many believe that it is truly haunted.
There you have it folks, the stories of 10 haunted paintings!
The episode was supposed to be scary and suspenseful but thanks to the two idiots with me, they turned it into a comedic episode…
Check out some other moments
if you enjoyed "Lobster Boy" you might like our previous episode "Fermat's Last Theorem" where we talk a math problem that puzzled the world.