There are some artists who know how to use the right medium, or rather the medium that is inexorably associated with the subject.
I just saw this piece made by David S. Palmer, a contemporary artist living in Laguna Beach CA, and I thought it was very powerful, the sort of thing that is assured to trigger a strong emotion: this portrait of John Lennon is actually made of bullet casings. Real ones!
It’s not a painting, it’s closer to a sculpture whose subject is reborn using what destroyed him… In the same vein, Palmer also did a portrait of Tupac and (not music related) Abraham Lincoln.