Close Ups: [link]

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What do you feel when you're in the dark?
Darkness is often associated with negative emotions - grief, despair, malice, and of course fear. Dark art here on dA usually portrays feelings of loss, sorrowful melancholy. On the even darker side there are macabre and horror genres. Hideous things may lurk in the dark... and this is the source of our fear: not the darkness itself, but what can be there with us, unseen.
However, if there are no reasons to be afraid, we can start appreciating what gifts darkness may provide. Sunlight gives humans energy boost; in the night we slow down and finally have the time to think deeper, not being distracted by vivid colours and noises. I for one have always loved caves - if illuminated by artificial lights, they become true spectacles of beauty. Time seems not to hurry; silence with distant echoes of dripping water and soft twilight invite me to stay still for a long while and think of everything or nothing at all, tuned in to my own heartbeat - because as long as I can see, I'm not afraid.

Dark Palace is my way to regain this feeling - solace, soothing comfort, being in harmony with myself.

What inspired me to choose this theme - I've heard lots of people saying they were doing (or not) dark art because of the darker qualities of human soul and the world in general. Our world is not bright and cheery; there is wrongness too.
Then someone told me that they like the darkness in my works - and indeed I do love dark palette, but the reason behind this is slightly different. I don't want to present darkness as threatening and something to be afraid of; quite contrary, twilight can greatly enhance the beauty. The difference is not what we can see - but what is hidden or obscured and thus left to our imagination.

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Gah, I hope I make sense. It's 4.40am in my place and what remains of my brain is shrieking 'sleep! sleep!' I guess I shouldn't postpone stuff then... 'cause always something unexpected can happen. In this case, I learnt two days ago that I would have one day less to make this manip because of important family event. Geez. I nearly worked myself to death trying to get it on time. Many thanks to ~aurei for support and constructive comments; if not for her, this thing would have ended in trash at least five times. It'd be a pity, especially that I'm rather satisfied with the outcome.

It was supposed to be conceptual variation about Dark Palace, but you know me + dreamy stuff = fail... So I ended up with a regular Dark Palace piece.
For some reason it was impossible to export it without quality loss It's much darker than it originally was. Maybe I should post close ups? >.>

Edit: lol, it sounds as if I was a sappy romantic. xD I'm going to leave it be, though. I spent enough time on writing this huge chunk of text.
Edit2: I uploaded brighter version. I don't know if it's not too bright though, so please commentt ^^'

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^{-> Entry in Express Your Feelings Contest held by ~fairyDany}

39 hours.
Building: [link] *Mehrunnisa-stock [link] [link] [link]
Background: Mart1n
Statues: =Falln-Stock tdbiii
Path: [link] ~stockII
Vegetation: =Shoofly-Stock
Brushes: ~spiritsighs-stock
+ own stock.

::.. Featured in Best of... Weekly Photomanip Features #74
..:: Featured in Weekly Deviant: Issue 07

<sup>*Fantasy-Fellowship, *IndigoChildren, ~HotelTransylvania have my permission to display this deviation in club galleries.

This image may not be used in any form, commercial or not, without my explicit written permission.</sup>