I could actually use some ego stroking on this one - only if you mean it, of course. But this piece has too much of my own angst and grief and feeling-betrayed wrapped up in it for me to be able to see it objectively, so I'm honestly not sure if it's a piece of crap or not.
Idyll's Moon
24"x36", acrylic on canvas
I'm not going to tell you much of the story that inspired this painting, as the book's not going to be released until Halloween. (If you haven't read Volume 1, go do so! It's amazing!) But the painting is about a being, a child of the Moon, who, upon completion of his greatest work of art, the Rose Dome you see in the painting, was betrayed and tortured by those he was working for. I was having a lot of similar (though nowhere near as dramatic) stuff going on this spring, so when I read that portion of the story it reached out through the page and grabbed me by the jugular. I agonized over the painting for months; I could hardly bear to look at it at times. Finally, I finished it, and came (mostly) to peace with what had happened - though I couldn't tell you which came first.