Medium: Watercolor on paper
Date: 2023
In the dim glow of a silvery moon, the untold tales of "The Boy Who Became a Hotel" find new life in its sequel. This is the story behind my featured artwork this week.
In this image, a new entity emerges—a monster whose form has yet to dance before my eyes, who’s meaning to me remains an enigma.
This central creature is not just an addition to the narrative; it is a reflection, a manifestation of growth, unpredictability, and the wildness of life's nature. In the predecessor story, a boy relinquished his very essence to the creatures of the forest, becoming a sanctuary embodied—a hotel shaped like a seated Buddha, replete with steps ascending to his core.
The sequel picks up under a starry night sky. A lone wolf, bathed in moonlight, emerges from the hotel. It lets out a powerful howl that echoes through the night, a call to the wild heart of the jungle. Its fur gleams, and the howl seems to beckon the unknown.
This image of the silver wolf is a symbol of the boy's evolution. Once a giver of life and shelter, he now embodies the vigor and the restless spirit of the wolf. The full moon's silver light heralds his new journey in the muted world—a world rich with life's humidity and murkiness.
And in response, the monster appears. Not unlike the creature captured in vibrant hues of red and blue in the accompanying illustration, it stands as the embodiment of life's fervor and its potential for rage. It perches upon the coils of a serpent, a spider lurking nearby under the full moon's watchful eye—a display of nature's enigmatic canvas.
It stands as a monolith to nature itself—wild, mysterious, and charged with the essence of both masculine and feminine, suggesting both imbalance and the potential for choice and transformation. It represents the maturity and untamed essence of life—a dichotomy of wildness we all possess within us.
The ensuing clash between wolf and monster, a spectacle of primal struggle, rages for hours until, exhausted, they collapse into a singular being at dawn's first light. Transformed by the sun's touch, they arise not as two, but one—a boy of twelve, at the cusp of manhood.
The convergence of boy and monster is a dance of duality: Maturing versus Nature. Their struggle, intense and exhausting, gives way to unity as the sun's rays interweave their forms into a single young soul.
With a host of animals at his side, the boy crafts a raft upon the river's edge. Together, they embark upon the water's path, collecting new companions along the way. Drifting beyond the jungle's embrace, they glimpse the city's silhouette through the mist—a beacon of the new lives that await them.
As night descends, they camp by the river's song, nourished and weary, dreaming of tomorrow. It is there, in the liminal space between the wilds they've left and the civilization that beckons, that their adventure towards the unknown continues.
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