True Illusion is my third attempt to interpret Evelyn de Morgan’s painting Night and Sleep. Drawn to de Morgan’s technique and her spiritual approach to life, my version focuses on the illusory nature not only of dreams but of life itself. It’s my attempt to find visual language for an idea that resists breaking down.
My version presents a deliberate tension between substance and dissolution. The drapery pays homage to the Renaissance admiration of human and reason, while the figure is simultaneously blending in with the atmosphere (or perhaps becoming it). The linen ground, allowed to show through, deepens that sense of deliberate vagueness.
My composition refuses a fixed orientation, leaving the viewer to form their own relationship with the work.