Unquiet
Things

Back in 2008, while I was still finding my voice with a modest little blog chronicling my cooking experiments and knitting projects, I spent countless hours as a devoted reader of other people’s online worlds. Those were the golden days of blogging, when each site felt like discovering someone’s secret diary left open on a cafe table. Though I mainly haunted the corners where home cooks shared their Rancho Gordo bean techniques and no-knead bread recipes, or where I envied the knitters trotting off to Rhinebeck, other blogging spheres existed in parallel – fashion blogs like Sea of Shoes, where a visionary teenage fashion enthusiast transformed vintage finds into fantastic narratives that felt more like glamourous fairy tales than outfit posts.

In early 2024, long after my own writing had evolved from those cozy domestic dispatches into explorations of art and the artfully macabre, I stumbled upon Jane Dashley’s paintings on Instagram. At first, I didn’t realize it was the same Jane as that marvelous fashion blogger! But the jolt of recognition in terms of the artwork was immediate and electric – here was a perfect embodiment of my very favorite vibe, what scholar and mystic Pam Grossman describes as “demented joy” – that quality of being “exuberant without being insufferably cheery, twisted but not cruel, bright but with undercurrents of gravity and shadow.”

It’s a concept that deeply resonates with my own aesthetic sensibilities – that space where childlike wonder collides with adult anxieties to create something electric and strange. In her work, I found this manifest in canvases teeming with impish devils attending formal balls and moonlit bacchanals that spark that same jubilant sense of ecstatic absurdity that I’m always seeking in art. It exists in that delirious twilight where sweetness sours slightly sinister, where lobsters attend midnight revels, bears take tea with unlikely companions, and the devil’s always in the details. Each painting feels like a folkloric postcard from the enchanted midnight woodlands of a surrealist snow globe brimming with the best and weirdest nursery rhymes. In short, it makes me want to dance a madcap jig and scream with delight!

I recently had the chance to speak with Jane about her journey from fashion blogger to painter and co-founder of the fragrance venture Fragraphilia. We delved into the fever-dream world of her canvases, where good and evil play dress-up and switch roles with gleeful abandon, where protective spirits keep watch while offering cake and ice cream sundaes, and devilry and revelry find their faces in furry friends.

Through Sea of Shoes, during the golden age of fashion blogging, you cultivated an extraordinary aesthetic vision – your sophisticated, avant-garde style choices and artful curation created something that transcended traditional fashion documentation. Now, you’re channeling that same transformative sensibility and expressing this distinctive vision into paintings that enchant and beguile. Could you talk about this evolution? How has your eye for the extraordinary – whether in vintage couture or painted dreamscapes – continued to develop and surprise you across these different mediums?

That is so kind of you to say! Thank you so much. I think what drew me to blogging back in the day was a really free-form outlet of expression. I used to do blog posts taping stuff together from magazines and drawing on notebook paper. I could write about anything I wanted and I really did. Besides fashion, I wrote about music and movies and toys I collected, and even my favorite types of fish.  As blogging progressed into more of a “job” and the magic of the original blogging days started to dull, I just wasn’t having a lot of fun anymore. But I was also becoming an adult, and I think I just accepted that my job was less fun because that’s what growing up meant. So I kept on for a while, but growing more disenchanted with the passing of time.

Luckily, the pandemic gave me the push to turn the art I was already making into a full-time thing. It’s been the most amazing shift, I never knew I could have this much fun. Ironically, as a working artist and frazzled mother of a toddler, I have very few opportunities to dress up these days. I still definitely see the crossover between my sense of fashion and what I bring up when I am creating a painting. It all comes from the same place, and it’s interesting to see how that plays out over the years.

There’s something delightfully feverish about your work, its whimsical creatures and anthropomorphic animals in vibrant dreamscapes of bacchanals and bonfire nights – you describe it as ‘happiness bordering on delirium.’ How do you achieve this particular emotional frequency in your pieces, and what state of mind are you typically in while creating?

I have a hysterical need to be making as much work as possible at all times. I just counted, and I made 82 finished paintings last year, which does feel like a lot for a year that involved a move and taking care of a toddler. I think my obsession with the work I’m creating, as well as a wolfish desire to make as much of it as I possibly can, contribute to the feverish frequency you’re picking up on! I work on many paintings at once. My notebooks are filled with multiple penciled-in squares that contain very hastily rendered painting ideas, almost like a swatch book of upholstery fabric.

Usually, I have some piece of media going on in the background while I work, be it a movie or an album or an audiobook and I like to listen to them in loops. I listened to the Thandie Newton narration of Jane Eyre four times in the last year. I’ve been playing Cindy Lee’s Diamond Jubilee over and over. I like getting into a really obsessive and repetitive energy, and I think it’s a form of gratitude to wring everything you can from other art that influences you.

Your work seems to draw from timeless storytelling traditions – from folklore and fairy tales to the profound magic of Studio Ghibli films, even reimagining classical narratives like Swan Lake – where ordinary moments can suddenly open into something extraordinary, where boundaries between mundane and magical dissolve. How do these narrative traditions influence the way you think about enchantment and possibility in your own work?

I think I have a very typical girl obsession with fairy tales, especially coming from a household of sisters. You grow up hearing them, and they enchant you while also instructing you on what you should want and usually about how you must suffer to get it. And then you actually come of age, and you grow hair, and you start bleeding, and you’re gripped with pain, and you’re kind of repulsed but compelled toward boys and men. It’s so awful and hilarious. But you still love those goddamn fairy tales! Luckily there’s Angela Carter. I guess many of the origins of fairytales are just women trying to make sense of the horrible things that have happened to them. I think this is healthy and wonderful, and playing into these narratives makes me feel connected to the lineage of humanity.

Your paintings seem to exist in an interconnected dream world populated by recurring characters – cats and lobsters, bunnies and teddy bears, protective magical creatures alongside mischievous ones like your signature devil in their ballgown. Could you tell us about how this personal mythology evolved and what these figures represent in your creative universe?

I grew up surrounded by animals, my mom was a big dog rescue person so we always had 5-10 dogs in the house at once. We had a bull mastiff wander into our garage one random day, and ever since then, my mom has been part of bull mastiff rescue groups. They are such magnificent dogs. I loved to draw their beautiful strong limbs and toenails, I got interested in animal shapes this way. I also had a black cat as an imaginary friend/inner guiding voice until I was way too old to admit, which probably explains a lot of my work. My earliest memories are dreams I had of large freshwater fish, such as the Amazonian river fish, the Arapaima. I have a LOT of weird animal hang-ups that would take me a long time to detail, and I would say they are all the impetus for almost all of my work.

Days before I gave birth to my son, I wasn’t sleeping well and I stayed up painting this masked tiger figure that just came to my imagination. I felt like this tiger captured the spirit of my son and it felt like a kind of a creative spirit labor that took place before any kind of actual birth labor. I always knew that tiger would represent my son to me. And what’s weird is that the toy my son became most attached to early on is a toy tiger! He has a stuffed toy tiger that does absolutely everything with us, and he gravitated to it all on his own. I spend all day every day talking to this toy tiger with my son. It wigs me out sometimes!

In your work, there’s often a fascinating interplay between light and shadow – literal and metaphorical. Your celebrations have an edge of wildness, your brightest pieces pulse with an almost supernatural energy. You’ve spoken about darkness as a space where we “tune in, maybe better than we have ever tuned in before.” How do you think about the role of darkness in your work – not just as an aesthetic choice, but as a way of seeing or understanding?

People always talk about the darkness in my work, and sometimes, I have a really hard time seeing it because I have so much fun making it.  Then I get honest with myself and I have to admit that I’ve painted like, carcasses and bunnies being mauled in pretty recent memory. Right now, I am painting naked horny fairy women chasing hairy beasts. To me, it’s so second nature to bring in aspects of fear and death because that’s life.  I think, as children, we have a natural compulsion towards darkness because we’re trying to make sense of all the fears we can’t understand yet. Children integrate darkness into their play and imaginary worlds so that they can learn to cope with it later on. Maybe I’m still doing that.

I’m shamelessly nosy about artists’ creative spaces! Could you invite us into your studio – what does your workspace look like, what are your must-have tools and materials, and do you have any particular rituals or routines when you’re creating?

Last year, we bought a home with windows and a pretty big garage added to it. It’s been my studio, and every day, I could kiss the ground because I’m so grateful to have so much space to work. I work best when I have a lot going on at once. My studio is crammed with many works in progress and lots of notes taped to the wall. I have two tables in the middle, one where I do small work or admin stuff and one where I can pack paintings or for a friend to come to work alongside me in my studio. I do my large work against the walls. I work almost every night, and I play music and always keep a stash of pimento cheese in my freezer to keep my motivation up!

Can you tell us about a particular piece that marked a significant evolution or breakthrough in your artistic journey?

Christmasland is a painting I did in 2022, and upon its completion, I was very pleased with the level of weirdness it achieved. The stare of the cat’s eyes holds something that feels like a part of myself. I felt maybe it was too weird for other people to like, but when I shared it on Twitter, it got a huge response, and I gained a whole new audience. I’m still very grateful for this experience, it gives me hope to this day when I try something that feels too awkward or wonky and I feel the temptation to abandon it. I remember Christmasland!

Let’s talk about your artistic lineage – what were the formative experiences or artworks that shaped your creative vision when you were starting out? Who are the artists, past or present, that you feel in conversation with?

I come from a very creative family; my mom, my aunt, and my grandma are all artists in some way. Early on in my life, and I couldn’t say when, I had a concept of what folk and outsider art was. My grandma was really into buying and selling antiques back in the day and she was always showing me art or movies when I stayed at her house. She liked John Waters movies and outsider art a lot. She was definitely not a normal grandma. I remember being 6 or 7 years old and being taken on a school field trip to the Dallas Art Museum and thinking to myself that while I appreciated the skill of these very stiff and formal American landscape paintings we were being taken to see, it just didn’t excite me like the paintings in the folk art books I would look at. Art books were a big thing in my life early on, I was lucky to have parents that nurtured what they saw that I loved. So, I was interested in this tension between what I was being told “good art” was and the art that actually excited me. Outsider art, folk art, whatever you want to call it…all of the stuff I liked when I was a teenager is still the best stuff to me. I have books on Nellie Mae Rowe and Joseph Yoakum that I bought when I was 16 years old that I look at all the time. I also remember being very gripped by the painting “Sitting on a Bench with Border” by Rose Wylie and I probably saw it around the time it was done, 2007. I printed it out on my computer and just stared at it constantly. Rose’s work was a huge shift for me when I first saw it, and she is still one of my biggest inspirations.

You and your husband Jeff, created Fragraphilia – a personal journal, review site, and podcast celebrating the artistry of niche perfumery. Could you share a bit about your history with scent and how this sensory world has evolved alongside your visual art? How do you find these different forms of artistic expression – the visible world of your paintings and the invisible landscapes of fragrance – informing and enriching each other?

I really never thought I was a perfume person until we got a Serge Lutens counter here in Dallas. I grew up in the era of Victoria’s Secret body sprays, which turned me off of perfume for the most part. Then, when I smelled Serge Lutens for the first time, my world shifted. I had never thought perfume could be so expressive. I want to say my first Serge bottle was Daim Blond, but for years, I wore Fille en Anguilles as my one and only perfume. My husband was a niche fragrance guy before we met, which I guess was pretty unusual back in those days.

Having a frag-head husband is really fun, especially since our tastes are nearly the same. Lately both work and childrearing take up a lot of the time that my husband and I used to have just for each other, so scent is a special thing that keeps us connected throughout the day. We always keep each other abreast of what scents we’re wearing throughout the day and talk about the wearing experience. The studio is a very lonely place, especially on dark, long nights, and my fragrance is often the only company I keep in there. It can absolutely set the tone for a painting session. I have just blind-bought Reve d’Ossian on your recommendation and I absolutely intend to use it as a creative guide in a new series of work. I never blind buy, I am so excited to be taken on this journey. Thank you for the inspiration!’

I’m unabashedly nosy about all the little things that bring joy and delight to creative people’s lives! Would you share some current favorites – this could be anything at all, from your perfect morning beverage to a holy grail skincare product to the coziest painting socks to whatever show you’re binge-watching right now. What small pleasures are making your days a bit more magical?

This year, I gave myself the gift of a History Hit subscription, and I can’t stop telling everyone how great it is. It’s educational but it is also an escape to a different time. I really like the show Gone Medieval and Not Just the Tudors. They also do these great documentaries you can watch on their app where they take you on tours of castles and stuff like that. I keep them playing while I work. I also love audiobook performances. One I loved last year was Red Rabbit by Alex Grecian as read by John Pirhalla. It’s western folk horror, and I loved what the audiobook performance added to the story. I listened to it a few times in a row. Lately, I’ve done a lot of Edith Wharton audiobooks, too.

Your work often feels like it exists in its own dreamy universe, but I’d love to know what inspires you in the real world – do you have favorite places you visit for inspiration, certain times of day when ideas come to you, or particular environments that spark your creativity?

My happy place is definitely Half Price Books. We are lucky to have the flagship location here in Dallas. It’s very calming, and I like the dig. The art book selection is not as good as it used to be, sadly. Before the pandemic, I used to find the most insane rare books in their art collection, no matter how frequently I went. I think that they started culling some of the good ones and selling them online in recent years. I still really like going there when I need inspiration. I started collecting children’s books as a teenager, and I love that I have an excuse to buy even more now that I’m a mom. You can find great old ones that are out of print at Half Price! I hear whispers they may open a tiki bar inside of the flagship. That would basically be heaven on earth for me.

You’ve built these remarkable creative worlds – through fashion, through painting, through fragrance – each one distinct but somehow connected by your distinctive vision. What have you learned about following your creative instincts across these different territories? What would you share with others who feel drawn to explore multiple forms of artistic expression?

I can see now that having played in so many fields of creativity, all of it matters. Every little sketch or every little note you wrote to yourself or every song or movie you’ve fallen in love with. And because of that, it’s so important to honor those fragile beginnings. It doesn’t matter how far into your artistic journey you are, whenever you are creating anything, there will be parts that just feel horrible. Often, the beginning or the near-completion point of a project brings on abject misery and despair. Don’t throw away your work! You have to be kind to yourself and honor the first spark of inspiration you felt and see it through or save it for some other time. I often come back to years-old ideas or inspirations. It’s so important to save everything and to treat the artifacts of your creative labors with tender love and care. It takes work to cultivate, most artists have fragile egos and are their own worst critics. Even if the time isn’t right for an idea at the moment, it will come back around, so save all of your notebooks and sketches.

Find Jane Dashley: Website // Instagram

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I am currently ensorcelled by Petah Coyne’s darkly romantic sculptures, where wax, silk flowers, and taxidermy birds transform into ethereal, baroque-like forms. Her pieces conjure the atmosphere of those moments in gothic paperbacks where the heroine discovers the truth isn’t in the attic after all, but blooming madly in plain sight in the conservatory. Massive chandeliers of black flowers drip with wax, their surfaces catching light in unexpected ways, like something dredged up from the depths but somehow still gleaming.

While the scale of her work is awe-inspiring – these aren’t delicate tabletop pieces but enormous installations that gather the shadows around them like dark pools, and seem to seep into every corner of their spaces. Delicate pearl pins catch stray beams of light, velvet moves like ink suspended in water, and wax accumulates in layers that feel ancient yet freshly formed. These pieces exist in a realm between preservation and decay, between memory and loss. Like Miss Havisham’s wedding cake, if it evolved into something nightmarish, they speak to mortality and remembrance through both their imposing presence and their intimate details.

Her use of materials is particularly spellbinding – especially the way she works with velvet, creating rich, undulating landscapes that cascade through space. The fabric collects twilight in its folds, transforming familiar luxury into something more complex and otherworldly. The way she builds up layers feels like discovering an enchanted chest where all the scraps and jewels and rich gowns from fairy tale queens have been deconstructed, scattered, and reassembled to tell new stories.

Here are the remnants of familiar tales – silk flowers trapped in crystalline wax, strands of pearls woven through branches, ribbons stiffened into strange new forms – all transformed into a private language written in texture and shadow. In these environments, collective memory mingles with personal mythology, where each element carries a story of mortality, memory, desire, and loss – private griefs and universal longings captured in frozen moments of perpetual bloom.

If you enjoy posts like these or if you have ever enjoyed or been inspired by something I have written, and you would like to support this blog, consider buying the author a coffee?

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Ever since we solved the mystery of the Wrinkle in Time cover artist, I’ve been itching to share more of Richard Bober’s work here. His art pulses with an otherworldly luminescence – sometimes veiled by murk and shadow, sometimes blazing in full ethereal splendor.

In his horror work, this shimmer peers through layers of gloom: take his cover for an Alfred Hitchcock collection, where the master of suspense sits at his desk in an eerily shadowed room. The exquisitely blown glass lamps and lanterns suspended from the ceiling cast their glow through a heavy atmospheric haze, while behind him, the stark silhouette of an upraised arm clutching a knife cuts through all that diffused glitter – a perfect contrast of light and shadow, sparkle and threat.

This radiance struggles through a different kind of murk in his pulpy sci-fi pieces, wading through cosmic morass and alien atmospheres. But in his more fantastical works, that same light breaks free entirely – illuminating visions of impossible beauty. Take this utterly bizarre bar scene: at first glance, it’s teeming with aliens of every imaginable variety, but look closer, and you’ll find it’s set in what appears to be an old-world gentleman’s club, all dark polished wood and traditional elegance, complete with a figure in a powdered wig – yet overhead hangs a disco ball, transforming this stately space into some kind of interdimensional nightspot.

On the cover of Esther M. Friesner’s Mustapha and His Wise Dog, a dragon is emerging from what can only be described as a posh fantasy spa-castle-pagoda onto a balcony where regal figures blithely recline in a hot tub overlooking an iridescent sea.I have never read the book, and I don’t know what it’s about, so there’s no doubt that my description bears not one iota of relevance to the actual plot!!

Anyway, even his portrait of an orc – traditionally the most brutish of fantasy creatures – finds a balance between that shadowy murk and shimmering dignity. Ugly but make it fashion, as they say.

I discovered these pieces in reverse, really. First came his portrait of an aristocratic vampire lady while I was researching The Art of Darkness – a piece so captivating I desperately tried to include it in the book. Then there was that infamous 1976 Dell/Laurel Leaf paperback cover of A Wrinkle in Time, with its red-eyed specter and improbable winged centaur. That cover had lived in my memory since childhood, and when I began work on The Art of Fantasy, I knew I wanted to include this piece of beautiful nightmare fuel.

But I’d been down this road before – previous searches for the artist’s identity had led only to dead ends. By the time my hunt began again in earnest, my book was already at the printer’s, and my blog post about the mysterious cover artist had exploded across social media.

I had no idea then that the two pieces that had independently captured my imagination – the elegant vampire and the cosmic horror of the Wrinkle cover – sprang from the same artistic wellspring. Amid the avalanche of suggestions and theories that poured in during the investigation, there were these quiet, prescient hints – my friend Keith mentioned Bober’s name in my Facebook comments, and on Twitter, Wallace Polsom pointed out those distinctive sickly greens in Bober’s Hitchcock covers.

Adam Rowe of 70’s Sci-Fi Art, whose expertise in this era of illustration is unmatched, lent his considerable knowledge to the investigation. When Endless Thread took up the mystery (a whole story unto itself), their investigation would eventually prove these subtle clues significant, unraveling the threads that connected these works I’d loved for such different reasons.

While most of Bober’s work focused on the fantastical and the eerie, he occasionally turned his eye to still-life compositions with delightfully macabre results. The cover for 12 Stories They Wouldn’t Let Me Do on TV showcases a gleefully sinister collection – a bundle of dynamite, a bullet, a scorpion, a bottle of poison, some sort of firearm (a musket? I don’t know guns, okay?), and a skull with a lone eyeball rolling grotesquely in its socket.

It’s a vignette that, as it turns out, hints at an artistic legacy carried forward by his nephew.

As noted in the Endless Thread interview, Richard’s nephew Matthew remembers the Wrinkle in Time cover as the first book he had read that his uncle did the cover for, talking about it in school. He would later spend time in his uncle’s basement, where paintings were stored around a pool table, and eventually helped digitize Richard’s slides – an informal archive of work photographed on 35mm film.

But most meaningful were the countless nights spent watching his uncle work: “He would always let me sit there and watch him paint. So, many, many, many, many nights, I got to sit there and just watch him work on a cover or whatever he was working on. So I learned an incredible lot from that — to see the profession, what it meant to be a professional, you know, and just watch that. It’s… I can’t even describe what that meant to me.”

Matthew is an artist himself, and scrolling through his Instagram sends me into absolute paroxysms of demented glee. His hyper-realistic still lifes feel like the most perfect gatherings of misfit treasures – think of those sad little ceramic creatures you sometimes find in thrift stores, the ones with slight chips or haunting expressions that make other people pass them by, the forgotten mechanical toys and vacant-eyed dolls that seem to be asking for someone to take them home and give them new life.

In Matthew’s paintings, these precious oddities come together in the extraordinary gatherings. Porcelain doll heads with empty, searching eyes commune with clay skulls, while owls, bunnies, elephants and the most beautifully unsettling clowns gather for what feels like the coziest of strange tea parties. Wind-up alligators and other odd little mechanical toys peek out from the edges, each one seeming curious and somehow alive, as if caught in the middle of their own secret adventures. He captures every worn edge and chipped surface with such loving attention, transforming these overlooked treasures into something magical through sheer technical precision and an absolutely infectious sense of joy.

Every time I look at one of his pieces, I discover some new detail that makes my greedy little goblin heart do shriekingly clumsy cartwheels of delight.

Bober was famously private and perhaps a bit of a technophobe – he had no cell phone, no computer, not even long-distance phone service. His agent, Jane Frank, called him a recluse; in nearly 30 years of representing him, she only met him once, often accepting awards on his behalf at conventions while assuring people he wasn’t merely a figment of her imagination.

For a fascinating deep dive into Bober’s artistic philosophy and his complex relationship with tradition and modernity, I highly recommend this illuminating profile from the summer before his passing: Richard Bober: Gift of the Old Masters.

What truly enchants me about Bober’s work is its shimmering, glittering quality – a sort of luminous magic that infuses even his darkest artworks. Looking at these pieces, I want to gather up all of Bober’s paintings and stitch them into the most extraordinary ballgown – imagine the sweep of that skirt, each panel flickering between horror and beauty, between the mundane and the cosmic.

The bodice would be crafted from his Hitchcock covers, all those sickly greens and oceanic blues swirling together. The full skirt would be a phantasmagoria of his fantasy works – that hot tub dragon scene forming a shimmering border, while aliens and orcs and vampire aristocrats dance across the fabric.

And there, right at the heart of it, that nightmarish Wrinkle in Time centaur would spread its rainbow wings across the waist, its companion’s red eyes glowing like rubies in the folds of fabric. It would be a gown for a masquerade at the end of the universe, where all of Bober’s creations could finally meet and mingle.

I harbor this slightly ridiculous dream: that someday, The Art of Fantasy might go into a tenth-anniversary edition. Let’s be real – my books about weird, dark art are probably far too niche (and, I suspect, so far under the radar as to be subterranean) to ever be bestsellers, but wouldn’t it be something if that haunting Wrinkle in Time cover could land among its pages?

Not that it matters much – Bober’s art is out there now, inspiring new generations of readers and artists, no longer anonymous but celebrated for the strange and shimmering legacy it is. Still… a ghoul can dream!

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As I prepared for this interview about Naomi Sangreal’s Little Hidden Doors, I found myself drifting through the landscapes of my own recurring dreams. They arrive unbidden, like persistent visitors who know where I keep the spare key: there I am at Checkers, my first job at fifteen, somehow still on the schedule thirty years later with unclaimed paychecks waiting for me; or I’m at the health food store I worked at while I was living in New Jersey, eternally trying to close up as customers mysteriously materialize through locked doors and darkened spaces. Sometimes I’m struck with the heart-stopping realization that I’ve forgotten about a phantom apartment somewhere, with ghostly cats waiting to be fed. But perhaps most luminous among these visitations was a single dream about my beloved tuxedo cat, Inkers, who appeared to me on a childhood path after her death, leading me through an impossible doorway in her own throat – a dream that spoke to the ineffable nature of loss and the labyrinthine corridors of grief. These dreams, persistent and precious, seem to embody what Jung called “little hidden doors in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul.” They’re exactly the kind of ethereal material that our interview subject suggests we should embrace, rather than dismiss as mere midnight wanderings.

Little Hidden Doors: A Guided Journal for Deep Dreamers by Naomi Sangreal  is an enchanted threshold into the mysteries of our sleeping minds – a luminous sanctuary where dreamers can unfold the origami of their unconscious thoughts. My own copy is heavily annotated, its margins filled with midnight revelations and sunrise insights, and it has become one of my most frequently recommended books, as well.

Through an alchemical blend of psychological wisdom and soul-stirring creative prompts, Sangreal becomes our gentle guide through the labyrinth of dream interpretation, translating complex Jungian concepts into whispered revelations that feel like secrets shared in twilight. In our meandering conversation, we wander through shadowed corridors and sunlit chambers of dream exploration: from the quiet rebellion of honoring our nocturnal visions in a world that prizes constant wakefulness, to the shimmering potential of lucid dreaming as a practice ground for transformation. We pause to examine nightmares not as terrors to be fled from, but as dark messengers bearing gifts of insight, and explore how the gossamer threads of dreamwork weave themselves into the tapestry of our waking lives. Sangreal’s voice – both as psychotherapist and intuitive wayfinder – illuminates our path as she shares her own dream-touched stories, including a pivotal vision that beckoned her toward her calling as a counselor, while offering gentle lanterns of wisdom to those just beginning to map their own dreamscapes.

Unquiet Things: Your book title, “Little Hidden Doors,” evokes a sense of mystery and discovery. Can you elaborate on what these “doors” represent in our dream life and psyche?

Naomi Sangreal: The title comes from one of Carl Jung’s renowned quotes, “The dream is a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul, opening into that cosmic night which was psyche long before there was any ego-consciousness, and which will remain psyche no matter how far our ego-consciousness extends.”

Jung describes how our ego consciousness remains small and separate, whereas through the dream we have access to this multidimensional and timeless experience of primordial wholeness. I see these doors as opportunities and inklings, ushering us as we might follow our curiosity through the corridors of an abandoned mansion; we choose which rooms we enter and the deeper we go the more treasures we may find. Dreams are incredible intrapsychic doors into our deep psyche.

You mention that paying attention to our dreams is revolutionary. How can this practice of dream engagement serve as a form of rebellion against what you call “wake-centricity” in modern society?

Revolutionary in the sense that dreams show us what we don’t want to know or see, what is disavowed and unallowed. They are raw, unfiltered and untouched by the social norms, rules and regulations of morality and waking consciousness and by interacting with them we can make contact with truer aspects of ourselves that may not be accessible or embraced by our waking external circumstances or environment. Dreams can offer us transformative experiences and life-changing ideas that we may not have access to in daily life. They share problem-solving wisdom and new insights that we can bring into our lives and our communities to create change.

You discuss the concept of the anima in your work. For those unfamiliar with Jungian psychology, could you explain what the anima is and why reconnecting with it is important in our current societal context?

In Jungian psychology, the anima archetype speaks to the inner feminine principle and the animus to the inner masculine soul that is not yet made manifest. According to Jung, the anima and animus are the contrasexual archetypes of the psyche. They are built from feminine and masculine archetypes from the individual experience as well as experiences with parents and collective, social, and cultural images. These inner figures seek to balance out our otherwise possibly one-sided experience of gender energy or personality expression and call us toward expressing our deep soulful wholeness. We are all both, but sometimes express varying levels of one or the other outwardly at different times. Our inner experience compensates to ensure the balance of our nature, which often is completely unconscious.

Marion Woodman states, “The tragedy and the danger of a patriarchal society is that too often it suffers the terrible consequences of leaving the feminine soul in both men and women in a repressed and abandoned state. Wherever this happens, the ego, unrefined and undeveloped by intercourse with the inner feminine, functions at a brutal, barbaric level, measuring its strength paradoxically by its power to destroy in the name of an inhuman ideal.” Perfectionism is a patriarchal plague. In inviting the anima into consciousness, we can harness her creative potential and enliven the Eros within, calling us toward the rebalancing of feminine power.

You introduce an intriguing perspective on nightmares, suggesting we invite these scary elements into our space. Can you walk us through this process and its potential benefits?

Our shadow can appear in nightmares as perils, gargoyles, tricksters, unsightly beings, or maybe just someone we don’t like. These figures are often helpful guide-look posts at a crossroads showing us exactly which way we need to go. When we can address and face these rejected parts of our psyche; we can further integrate our wholeness and take back our personal power.

Nightmares are not necessarily an indication that something is wrong. They are often more effective messengers. We often remember nightmares more than we do other types of dreams because they are so visually and emotionally impactful. This is for a number of reasons, one being that nightmares are specifically formulated to get your attention. A nightmare figure may have something important to communicate to you or be an aspect of your psyche or shadow that is starved for nourishment and attention. I offer a full guided experience and journaling prompts in my permanent online class through Ritualcravt, as well as detailed in the book!

You mention the concept of “flow state” in your book. I’ve heard this term before, but I am still not entirely sure I understand its meaning. How does this relate to dreamwork, and can engaging with our dreams help us access flow states more easily in our waking lives?

Flow theory was initiated by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in 1975 and held that creative activity can actually influence emotional affect by eliciting the experience of flow. Flow is defined as “an automatic, effortless, yet highly focused state of consciousness” and has been conceptualized as a particular type of optimal experience associated with vital engagement, which is a deep involvement in activities that are significant to the self and that promote feelings of aliveness and vitality. Flow causes deactivation in the brain, and the brain begins to switch from conscious processing, which is extremely slow and energy expensive, to subconscious processing, which is quick and energy efficient. We see this have negative impacts when our brain starts tuning out positive and helpful stimulus and focusing only on survival and threat, but in the experience of flow it has a positive impact in that we get completely absorbed in our creative activity and the brain reduces our anxiety and actually has an opportunity to heal.

The idea of “changing the world from the inside out” through dreamwork is fascinating. How do you envision this internal work manifesting in external reality?

All inner work manifests in the world around us. It changes us and therefore changes our choices and our relationships. If dreamwork is the primary way in which we can face our unconscious directly, it is a prime opportunity for some of the most challenging and liberating self work that we have access to. I have both personally experienced this level of change and watched dreamwork transform my patients lives.

You describe dreams as “vivid visual gifts.” How can people who don’t typically remember their dreams or don’t consider themselves visually oriented benefit from dreamwork?

Dreams are not just visual, they are often highly emotional. Even paying attention to the emotional arch of a dream and the embodied memory of interactions or sensations gives us clues to what is living in the unconscious. There are many styles of dreamwork and ways to work with dreams, they can be felt, acted out, spoken, written, made into poems, plays or songs. Whatever creative venue feels most intuitive to you is ripe for your dreams to emerge, working on and through you. I am partial to visual expressions in part because my dreams are vivid and I am a visual artist.

Have you noticed any shifts in how people relate to their dreams since you began your work in this field? If so, what changes have you observed?

Yes! Overall dreams seem to be taking off collectively in a huge way! When I first sought out dream work in therapy there was only ONE therapist in all of Portland whom I could find (who wasn’t friends with my mom lol) to see who worked with dreams. Now tons more folx are working with dreams, offering classes and writing about dreams online. The dreaming community continues to grow and it is amazing.

In your book, you discuss using lucid dreaming as a practice ground for real-life skills like public speaking. (I’d probably use it for highway driving, which terrifies me!) Could you elaborate on this idea? How can people harness their lucid dreams to improve their waking life abilities, and what other skills might benefit from this dream practice?

Lucid dreaming has been used all over the world to practice difficult tasks, learn new instruments and languages, even face general fears like public speaking. Dreamwork is not only creative and spiritual, it is incredibly useful and practical. For example, when a person is lucid dreaming, they have access to literally any tools that might help them grow. They can practice diving, summon instruments or books, and engage in sports or other physical activities without limitation. Once a dreamer becomes experienced in inducing lucidity, they can use their ability to develop skills that are beneficial in waking life. A person is able to use the dream space to practice skills that have a direct impact on their physical muscle memory and prime their cognitive functions.

In your experience as a psychotherapist and intuitive guide, what’s the most surprising or profound insight you’ve gained about the human psyche through working with dreams?

Dreams never cease to surprise me. They show me over and over again that people have access to deep truths and spiritual images that can change the color of their mind and experience forever. Just one big dream can transform a person.

Your book combines various practices like writing, collage, and meditation. How did you develop this multifaceted approach to dreamwork, and why do you think it’s effective?

These practices are all well-known and documented across traditions both therapeutic and spiritual. I was definitely influenced by my mother, who is a prolific visual journalist, dream worker, SoulcollageTM facilitator, and psychotherapist. For me, bringing them together feels intuitive, engaging different senses; visual, mental, kinesthetic – word, image and imagination allows for greater access to unconsciousness and that is where we are trying to get to and to connect with through dreams.

Can you share a personal anecdote of how engaging with your dreams has led to a significant change or realization in your waking life?

As I mentioned briefly and vaguely in the book, a dream I worked in therapy told me to go to school for counseling. I don’t mind sharing it here; I dreamed I am on the steps of a building with 4 perpendicular sides. It looks gothic or church-like and on each side there are many steps leading up to a door. I ascend the steps and go inside. Somehow I know I need to go upstairs. I go up several flights and find my way into a big event room. There is some kind of conference or celebration happening. The room is full of all different types of people milling about and talking. I take a seat in a chair toward the back of the room near a window. I am introverted, so I tend to wallflower and observe in these types of situations. I sit quietly and listen, gently rocking (autistics will know lol). I am able to hear everyone’s conversations loudly, even private whispered exchanges close to one another’s ears.

I hear people complaining. “I am a professor and I hate my job.”

“Oh really?”

“I am a medical doctor and it’s awful, I’m so unfulfilled.”

I quickly realize that all of these successful and professional people hate their jobs and have no idea who they are or what they want to do. I start rocking harder in my chair and I yell loudly “I know exactly what I want to do!” Everyone stops talking and looks at me. They all say collectively, “Well then why don’t you go do it?” I run out of the room and down the stairs. The next morning I applied to college.

For someone new to intentional dreamwork, what’s one simple practice you’d recommend they start with tonight?

Just set the intention before you go to sleep, “when I wake up, I will remember my dreams” and try to gently recall your dreams as soon as you wake up. Practice, practice, practice.

As someone fascinated by the power of routine and ritual, I’m curious about your personal practices. Would you mind sharing your nighttime routine? What rituals or habits have you found most effective for nurturing quality sleep and rich dream experiences?”

I discuss some sleep hygiene suggestions in the book, but a few personal supports I left out are the manta sleep mask – it’s absolutely incredible – and a grounding sheet. I sleep in a cold room, read before bed, minimize artificial lighting and no screen time. Baths and meditation are also a huge help for me in winding down. I am actually not a night person, I usually go to sleep around 8:30 pm – most of my rituals are morning rituals, which included recording my dreams.

As both a creative soul and an adept navigator of dreamscapes, I’m curious about how you perceive the relationship between dreams and various art forms. Beyond visual art, how do you think other mediums like music, literature, or even scent art like perfumery might intersect with or be influenced by our dream experiences? Have you explored any of these connections in your own practice or research?”

Scent! The olfactory sense is rare in dreams but not completely absent. Just this week I dreamed of an ex’s bad breath lol – smell is, as you know, deeply connected to emotion and memory. Good smells and perfumes can be used to invite sweet spirits and influence our dreams in positive ways! I would be curious if anyone has made a perfume for dreaming? Possibly including some of the well-known oneiric plants or flowers? I know cologne, sprays, and perfumes are used in folk magic practices, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were specific ones for dreams and dreaming. [Author Edit: here are some of my favorite sleeping and dreaming scents!]

Find Naomi Sangreal: website //Instagram

All imagery courtesy Naomi Sangreal.

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When I was curating images for my book The Art of Fantasy: A Visual Sourcebook Of All That Is Unreal, I found myself drawn to the peculiar charm of Max Frey’s undersea tableau not because it featured an obviously fantastical creature like a dragon or unicorn, but because it captured something equally magical: the strange poetry of a human figure astride a sea slug, as casual as if riding a horse through city streets.

Frey’s fascination with undersea subjects emerged during a time when the natural world was capturing the imagination of both scientists and artists alike. The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw an explosion of interest in marine biology, with publications like Ernst Haeckel’s “Art Forms in Nature” bringing the strange beauty of sea creatures to the public eye. This was an era when the depths of the ocean still held countless mysteries, and every new scientific expedition might reveal creatures that seemed as fantastical as any medieval bestiary.

Frey wasn’t alone in finding artistic potential in marine life. Odilon Redon transformed deep-sea creatures into mystical floating eyes and otherworldly blossoms. Jean Painlevé’s early underwater photography and films of seahorses and octopi revealed an underwater ballet so strange it influenced the Surrealists.

What sets Frey’s approach apart is how he places humans in direct interaction with these creatures. His figure atop the sea slug brings to mind the way Symbolist artist Arnold Böcklin placed classical figures among realistic Mediterranean landscapes. But where Böcklin’s work often leans into myth and melancholy, Frey’s sea slug rider maintains a wonderfully deadpan quality. The subject’s imperious expression suggests they see nothing unusual about their choice of vehicle – it’s everyone else who’s making it weird.

This wasn’t a one-off flight of fancy for Frey. His work reveals a whole series of these marine mounts, each more fantastic than the last. Some glide through the water with sleek, silvery bodies that wouldn’t look out of place on a pulp magazine cover. Others sport mohawk-like manes or crown-like fins atop their heads. Yet their riders maintain that same air of perfect nonchalance, as if commuting to some underwater office on their sea-slug steeds.

In ‘”Das Prinzesslein” (The Little Princess), Frey gives us a humanless scene – though perhaps not entirely. The central creature’s expression suggests a strange mix of concern, bewilderment, and haughty bearing as she surveys her underwater domain of muddy anemones and eels. A gross, leering, crab-like beast lurks nearby, barnacles and tentacles sprouting from it like some strange mutation. One can’t help but suspect we’re witnessing the aftermath of a curse, the little princess transformed but still maintaining her royal demeanor among these unsettling depths.

In “Das Wunder” (The Wonder), Frey takes us deeper still, into a dim underwater grotto where a serpentine creature – or possibly two creatures, it’s difficult to tell if we’re seeing a two-headed being or a pair – gawps at what appears to be a human figure encased in a glowing egg. The murky illumination from this strange cocoon creates the kind of scene you might expect in a deep-sea expedition’s fever dream.

Finally emerging onto land, we find “Tier und Mensch” (Animal and Human), where a hybrid of giraffe, llama, and dinosaur appears with pinky-beige hide and doleful expression, its wiggly ears and sad face giving it an almost apologetic air. A figure kneels beside this bizarre beast in an enigmatic vision that raises more questions than it answers. Like his undersea riders, Frey presents this unlikely encounter as if it were the most natural thing in the world, leaving us to puzzle over whether it’s the scene that’s strange, or merely our perception of it.

While New Objectivity and Symbolism appear frequently in descriptions of Frey’s work, these pieces suggest an artist operating in a territory entirely his own, where grand sea wyrms serve as commuter transport and sad-eyed hybrid beasts receive mysterious visitors. Each piece is presented with the calm assurance of someone who has witnessed something deeply weird and is simply waiting for the rest of us to catch up.

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In times of deep shadow, humanity has always reached for two torch flames: magic and art. Often, they burn as one – each a way of touching the invisible, of shaping reality from the raw stuff of imagination and will.

Each an attempt to make sense of a world that sometimes seems senseless, our fingers stretching toward that distant spark of understanding.

Art’s power lies not in offering escape, but in its unflinching ability to witness, to record, to create. It reflects our full humanity – our grief and our joy, our rage and our hope. Through this honest reflection, we find our strength. Our imaginations aren’t exits from reality – they’re tools for seeing it more clearly, for envisioning what could be.

Creation is an act of power – a reaching inward to find something stronger than our circumstances, a way of claiming space in a world that sometimes seems intent on shrinking us. We raise our hands to shape, to shield, to shatter what needs breaking.

Right now, many feel a profound weariness. But across time and space, across every circumstance, humans have made art. Like moths drawn to flame, we spiral ever toward the light of creation. It’s not just how we resist – it’s how we exist.

Art speaks what cannot be said plainly. Through it, we express the inexpressible, share what feels unshareable. These creations may come from any time, any place, any hand – but they speak to something universal in the human spirit.

Every brushstroke, every sculpted line, every carefully chosen word is a thread connecting us to everyone who has ever faced uncertainty and chosen to create anyway. It builds bridges between hearts, between centuries.

This is why we cannot stop making, cannot stop imagining better worlds into being. Art isn’t a luxury to set aside until better days. It’s how we live through all our days – through grief, through rage, through moments that feel impossible to bear. It’s how we express our truths, how we find each other when the weight feels crushing, our hearts, our voices, our visions blazing with possibility.

So create like your heart is on fire. Create like the world depends on it.

Because it does.

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I don’t recall when I first stumbled upon the artwork of Iris Compiet, but I can find evidence that I shared some of it over on my Tumblr way back in 2015, in the form of an elegant cat lady with two equally elegant skull-faced Sphinx felines cozied up on her lap. Yet, despite being able to pinpoint this specific encounter, I feel as if I have always known her work. Compiet’s creatures inhabit a corner of my mind that feels as ancient and familiar as childhood memories, as if they’ve been whispering their secrets to me all my life.

There’s a timeless quality to her art that transcends the moment of discovery. Her faeries, spirits, and otherworldly beings seem to exist in a realm just adjacent to our own, one that we’ve always known about but somehow forgot. It’s as though Compiet’s brush doesn’t create these entities so much as reveal them, pulling back the veil on a world that’s been there all along, patiently waiting for us to remember how to see it.

I am always thrilled to spot a familiar name in the artist’s credits for a Magic: The Gathering card, but when Iris Compiet’s name appeared on a handful of cards in a recent expansion, my heart performed a gleeful, flooping little pirouette. In the mystical realm of Valley, where fur and feathers pulse with arcane energy, Compiet’s brush evokes a world where the extraordinary and the endearing intertwine. Her Valley Flood Caller, an otter wizard resplendent in ceremonial garb wielding a staff of eldritch light, captures the whimsical gravitas of this imperiled animal kingdom. For those of us who’ve whiled away countless hours reverently sleeving our precious cardboard spells, Compiet’s art feels like stumbling upon a homecoming in a place we’ve only visited in dreams.

MtG entered my life in my 36th year, a gift from my then-new paramour, Yvan (13 years later, now my spouse!) It became our shared language, a perfect conduit for two introverts to connect. While I may never have fully grasped the game’s intricacies, I fell deeply in love – with the art, the worlds, and the person who introduced me to them. Many years later, my recent hair color is actually a Golgarian/Witherbloom ode! Seeing Iris Compiet’s art grace these cards feels like a beautiful convergence of passions, both old and new.

But to pigeonhole Compiet as merely a collectible trading card game illustrator would be to do a grave disservice to the extraordinary realms she explores and documents. For in truth, Iris Compiet isn’t just an artist – she’s a dreamer of the extraordinary, a chronicler of beings that exist in the misty realms between knowing and believing.

In Compiet’s ethereal renderings, fantastical entities materialize like visions from a waking dream. Her work invites us to become unwitting travelers in realms beyond our own, stumbling upon magical creatures and forgotten spirits with the wide-eyed wonder of an accidental explorer. The beings she portrays possess a gossamer quality that embraces their impossible nature. Each creation, whether fae, a forest spirit, or something entirely unclassifiable, is imbued with a haunting beauty and an air of mystery; you can almost see the mists of imagination swirling around them. This ability to capture the elusive, dreamlike quality of myth and legend is the hallmark of Compiet’s art. She creates beings that resonate with ancient whispers while feeling as fleeting and intangible as morning mist, as if they might fade back into the realm of dreams at any moment.

It is in her magnum opus, Faeries of the Faultlines, that Compiet’s dreamy visions find their fullest expression. This book is not merely a collection of artwork; it’s an explorer’s journal, a naturalist’s field guide to a world that exists in the periphery of our vision, in the spaces between heartbeats. The Faultlines, as Compiet reveals, are the gossamer-thin boundaries where our mundane world whispers secrets to realms unknown. These are the spaces where the veil between the human world and the fairy realm wears thin, allowing us to step into a reality that is at once familiar and utterly alien.

Through her paintings, sketches, and narrative notions, Compiet invites us to peer through rainbow-hued droplets, to trust that prickle at the back of our necks when we feel unseen eyes upon us. The veil, she assures us, is omnipresent – above, below, around, and even within us. We need only learn to look, to regain our Sight – that innate ability we all possessed as children to perceive the magical world that exists alongside our own.

Compiet’s faeries challenge conventional expectations, embodying nature’s capricious magic – as diverse, complex, and sometimes unsettling as the natural world itself. They can be eerily alluring, mischievous, melancholic, or utterly alien – but never predictable, never trite. These are not the sanitized sprites of Victorian fancy, but complex beings as varied as nature itself. They belong to neither the Seelie nor Unseelie courts exclusively, instead embodying a state of All – an encompassing existence that transcends our limited notions of good and evil. These are creatures of raw, wild magic, beautiful and dangerous in equal measure, their morality as alien to us as their forms are wondrous.

As we venture deeper into the Faultlines, Compiet introduces us to a mesmerizing menagerie of otherworldly beings. Here, we encounter the rooty, bulbous mandrake faeries, often mistaken for mere ugly tubers but possessing a blissful hallucinogenic magic of startling potency. We marvel at the magnificent green men, those benevolent forest guardians tasked with tending to all that grows, their bark-like skin a testament to their deep connection with the natural world. In murky bogs, swamps, and near thundering waterfalls, we glimpse creatures that seem born of water and shadow, while overhead, feathered beings of surpassing beauty soar on silent wings.

Shapeshifting witches flit at the edges of our vision, keepers of a precarious balance, their power to bestow dreams, nightmares, and health – whether boon or bane – a reminder of the capricious nature of fairy gifts. The many species of flesh-eating trolls lumber through this magical landscape, their presence a thrilling hint of danger. And everywhere, darting between roots and stones, we spot the countless varieties of small, hairy, mischievous gnomes, brownies, and hobgoblins, their antics a constant source of both delight and exasperation to their fairy kin.

In Compiet’s hands, each of these beings comes alive with a vivid specificity that makes them feel less like flights of fancy and more like subjects of an esoteric field guide, creatures as real and varied as any found in our own natural world. As we leaf through the pages of Faeries of the Faultlines, we’re invited to abandon our preconceptions and linear thinking, to flit from one fairy to another, immersing ourselves fully in this world that exists just beyond the corner of our eye. Compiet’s art becomes a key, unlocking the dormant ability within us to See – truly See – the magic that has always surrounded us, waiting patiently for us to remember how to look.

I feel immensely privileged to feature Compiet’s work in my book, The Art of Fantasy: A Visual Sourcebook Of All That Is Unreal. Her contribution offers readers a mesmerizing glimpse into the artistry that has made her a renowned figure in the world of fantastical imagery. The piece we included, a striking rendition of the Morrigan, perfectly encapsulates Compiet’s unique vision and skill.

In this powerful portrayal of the fearsome Celtic goddess of war, death, and fate, Compiet’s mastery is on full display. The deity’s face bears a grim yet wry expression, a subtle nod to the complexities of her nature. Shadowy, crow-like elements hint at the Morrigan’s shapeshifting abilities, adding layers of depth to the portrayal. With sober brilliance, Compiet captures the essence of this mythical being, creating an image that resonates with ancient power while feeling startlingly immediate.

This single work embodies the raw, untamed magic that courses through all of Compiet’s art. Drawing deep from the wells of European folklore, dark fairy tales, and spectral stories, Compiet’s creation gives form to half-remembered dreams and whispered myths, conjuring creatures and beings that feel as if they’ve drifted in from the edges of our consciousness. The Morrigan, as rendered by Compiet, is at once beautiful and terrible, alluring and intimidating – a being who defies easy categorization or moral simplification. Through this masterful illustration, we’re invited to confront the beautiful and terrible complexity of the otherworldly, to embrace a more primal sense of wonder that acknowledges both the allure and the danger of these liminal realms.

Compiet’s talent for bringing fantastical creatures to vivid life extends far beyond the Faultlines. Her artistic explorations have led her to document the denizens of other beloved magical realms as well. In The Dark Crystal Bestiary: The Definitive Guide to the Creatures of Thra, Compiet’s masterful renderings breathe new life into the rich world of Thra. Her interpretation of Aughra, in particular, is nothing short of magnificent, capturing the ancient sage’s wisdom, power, and otherworldly nature with stunning clarity. This work stands as a testament to Compiet’s ability to honor and enhance even the most iconic fantasy creations. Similarly, in Jim Henson’s Labyrinth: Bestiary: A Definitive Guide to the Creatures of the Goblin King’s Realm, Compiet’s brush infuses the weird and wonderful inhabitants of this cult classic world with her own ethereal style. Her explorations extend even to a galaxy far, far away in Star Wars Bestiary, Vol. 1: Creatures of the Galaxy, where her unique perspective transforms the exotic into the hauntingly familiar, making alien beings feel like half-remembered dreams from our own world. In each of these works, Compiet proves herself not just an artist, but a visual storyteller and worldbuilder, capable of enriching and expanding even the most well-established fantastical universes with her unique vision.

When she’s not chronicling the ways of the fae or breathing life into beloved fantasy realms, Compiet invites kindred spirits to join her on Patreon, where she shares secret glimpses of a world beyond our own. There, fellow dreamers might just find the key to unlocking their own Sight, allowing them to peer a little deeper into the misty realms that exist just beyond the corner of our eye.

And I will close out this blog post with a few secrets that Iris recently whispered to me, shared here with her blessing. The enchanted realms of the Faultlines are expanding their borders and are soon to be released in Germany, inviting a whole new audience to peer through the veil. For those already enchanted by the Faultlines, there’s more magic on the horizon. Iris is currently working on the next installment of Faeries of the Faultlines, and it promises to be something truly special – an oracle deck! Imagine holding the wisdom of the fae in your hands, each card a portal to hidden truths and ancient mysteries. Lastly, for readers familiar with my olfactory obsessions, you might be delighted to know that Iris and I share a fondness for enigmatic scents. When asked about her favorite fragrances, she revealed herself to be a big fan of the mysterious indie perfumers For Strange Women. These little glimpses into Iris’s world and work only deepen the mystery and allure of her art, leaving us eager for whatever magic she conjures next.

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A mysterious rider leans forward on a horse seemingly formed of living shadow, their posture speaking of urgency and a mission that cannot wait. Hair streams behind them, merging with the horse’s mane like a mesmerizing Rorschach test in motion, challenging us to decipher where intention ends and instinct begins. This breathtaking scene unfolds against a backdrop of lurid red – perhaps velvet curtains, a blood-tinged sunset, or the very gates of hell yawning open.

Conjured forth by contemporary artist Tristan Elwell in the cover art for Ashling by Isobelle Carmody, it encapsulates the spirit of high fantasy with an undercurrent of delicious menace. It speaks of quests undertaken in realms where the natural and supernatural coexist, evoking a world where untamed spirits race against looming shadows.

Fantastical, brooding imagery leaps from the covers of countless tomes, beckoning readers into realms of fantasy, young adult adventures, and thought-provoking editorials. Elwell’s darkly whimsical visions serve as portals, each image a visual distillation of complex narratives into single, compelling moments frozen in time. His art is like a tarot deck for the modern age, each image a card that tells a story of possible futures and hidden truths.

Beyond book covers, this artistic vision spills onto Magic: The Gathering cards; whether you’re cycling with Merfolk Looter or summoning a horde with Elvish Piper, Elwell’s contributions to this beloved bastion of nerdery transforms players’ hands into galleries of miniature masterpieces amidst their fantastical battles.

In this evocative scene featured in my book The Art of Fantasy: A Visual Sourcebook Of All That Is Unreal, we spy a levitating witch-like character slyly peeking over her shoulder to catch us in the act of observing her. Her wild grey hair billows in an unseen ethereal current, adding to her mystical allure. Below, a cat cleverly bats at an unseen ‘mouse,’ while a circle of arcane symbols swirls on the floor. An incongruous on/off button in the foreground adds a surprising modern touch to this magical scene. The image is bathed in the warm glow of a trio of pillar candles held aloft by wrought iron stands, illuminating this instance of the arcane and the contemporary.

A visual paradox where ancient sorcery and modern technology coexist in a single, mesmerizing moment, it’s an intriguing fusion that invites viewers to ponder the intersection of mystical arts and technological advancement, each complex in its own right. The image bears a whimsical resemblance to a somewhat archaic ad for witchy helpdesk support in PC Plus magazine, but it’s the captivating illustration adorning the cover of Curses, Inc. and Other Stories by Vivian Vande Velde.

Midnight in a graveyard, a sleek black cat paces at a crossroads, its presence both ominous and intriguing. Headstones thrust up from shaggy, unkempt grass, casting long shadows across the scene. The dampness of overgrown blades is almost palpable, their imagined rustle carried on a chill breeze. This haunting imagery for Witch Way to Murder by Shirley Damsgaard weaves a visual story of mystery and magic that entices the viewer to peer deeper into its shadows. I am totally judging a book by its cover here, but you can count me among the viewers enticed to peek! (I’m looking for a copy at the library as we speak!)

A domestic longhair cat, resplendent in a business suit, regards us with an expression of cunning professionalism. Its eyes glint with intelligence and a hint of mischief, suggesting playful yet potentially nefarious schemes. This clever and cute image, with its undercurrent of menacing shenanigans, graces the cover of John Scalzi’s Starter Villain and becomes a charming yet unsettling visual ambassador for Scalzi’s satirical exploration of corporate ethics and modern villainy.

The brilliance of this cover becomes even more apparent when considered alongside the book’s premise (which unlike a few above, I have actually read!) In Starter Villain, Charlie, a recently divorced substitute teacher, inherits his estranged uncle’s unconventional business: supervillainy.  Thrust into a world of lasers, talking cats, and unionized dolphins, Charlie embarks on a journey of self-discovery amidst the absurdity, where humor and intrigue simmer –dangerously, delightfully!–beneath the surface of a dormant volcano in a remote island lair.  Elwell’s suited cat perfectly serves as an ideal visual ambassador for Scalzi’s satirical exploration of corporate ethics and modern villainy.

Personal works reveal a deep appreciation for the gothic and dramatic. In “Isolation,” a striking figure perches high on a wire, defying gravity and convention. Adorned in a long black Victorian-style frock, complete with lace collar and cameo, the figure’s playful space buns add a touch of youthful spirit to the somber attire. An umbrella clutched in hand leaves us wondering: is it to ward off sun or rain? Four crows share the wire, a fifth ascending to join this curious gathering, regarding their human companion with interest but without malice, as if recognizing a kindred spirit in this darkly clad figure who has ventured into their domain.

“Inversion,” which just yesterday won First Place for Digital Art in the Beautiful Bizarre Magazine Art Prize (many sincere congratulations, Tristan!!) mirrors this scene but diverges dramatically. A nude woman hangs upside down from a wire, her body a study in grace and control. The tension in her form evokes a ballet dancer practicing passé relevés variations, every muscle defined, every line carefully considered. She shares her precarious perch with a quartet of bats, their expressions a mixture of fascination and bewilderment at this topsy-turvy human interloper. Behind them, the sky transitions to evening, wisps of clouds texturing the horizon as a distant flock of bats passes by.

These two pieces form a captivating diptych: from gothic Victorian aesthetic to an almost balletic nude, recurring motifs of solitary figures, wire perches, and avian companions create thematic links that invite contemplation on isolation, inversion, and the strange companions we find in lonely places. These works are like visual kōans, paradoxical vignettes that invite meditation on the nature of solitude and perspective.

Instagram sketches reveal a gallery of iconic figures: Elsa Lanchester’s Bride of Frankenstein, sultry silent film star Theda Bara, the hauntingly beautiful Peter Steele, and delightfully macabre Lily Munster. The artistic gaze extends beyond pure gothic to embrace a wider range of dramatic personalities: Nick Cave broods alongside Tom Waits, while the surreal world of David Lynch’s Eraserhead neighbors a classically melodramatic depiction of Salome offering John the Baptist’s head. His Instagram becomes a cabinet of curiosities, each sketch a specimen of pop culture preserved in the formaldehyde of Elwell’s distinctive style.

A particularly striking image captures an Edwardian lady in fencing attire, a red heart embroidered on her dress breast. It’s a masterful blend of historical aesthetics and symbolic elements, both beautiful and poignant.

While Elwell’s work has graced an impressive array of book covers spanning YA fantasy to cozy mystery and beyond, one can’t help but imagine the striking impact his art could have on gothic romance novels. Picture a cover where a graceful figure in a meticulously rendered Regency gown stands before a fog-shrouded manor, her hair tousled by an unseen wind. A sleek black cat winds around her ankles, its eyes gleaming with otherworldly intelligence, while a colony of bats silently wheels against the brooding sky.

Another scene might capture a moonlit balcony: a corseted Victorian beauty leans precariously over the railing, her lace-gloved hand outstretched toward a shadowy figure astride a powerful, dark horse in the garden below. The intricate detailing of her dress would be a testament to Elwell’s keen eye, while the play of light and shadow could hint at the passion and danger lurking within the pages. Or envision a windswept moor at twilight, where a lone rider on a ghostly pale horse gallops past ancient standing stones. In the foreground, crimson roses entwine with thorny vines, their blooms stark against the misty landscape.

Such covers would perfectly capture the genre’s signature blend of desire and dread, all while showcasing the motifs that make Elwell’s work so distinctively captivating. Elwell’s hypothetical gothic romance covers would be like Victorian valentines dipped in the blood of midnight ink – ornate, passionate, with just a touch of sly diablerie.

And finally, here is a Halloween cow. A bovine celebration of the most wonderful time of the year! Because beyond the artist’s keen eye for detail and all their technical wizardry and all those years of honing and refining their skills, we know the thing that truly counts is recognizing that animal + Halloween costume = pure, unadulterated gold. I’m not even joking. It is true! (You have no idea how much I love this cow!)

But seriously folks! Elwell’s portfolio is a cocktail of the macabre, the whimsical, and fantastical, shaken vigorously and served with a twist of sardonic wit. These works, from fully realized paintings to quick sketches, reveal an artist with an uncanny ability to capture the essence of his subjects, and his images act as windows to realms where magic, mystery, and wonder are tangible, ever-present forces. Infused with a dreamy darkness and a subtle but distinctive thread of mordant humor, these works captivate and inspire. They invite us to imagine worlds where a midnight ride on a shadow steed is possible, where a feline might stand guard at a haunted crossroads, or where a talking cat in a business suit could be plotting world domination.

 Speaking of how these works captivate and inspire, it was that very cat at that very crossroads that caught my eye back in 2010 when it was rampantly reblogged all over Tumblr sans credit or context. Searching out the artist responsible for it was how I first discovered Tristan’s body of work, which I have been following ever since. It feels like a very full-circle moment to have been able to include Tristan’s work in my book.  What a weird, wild, wonderful world! And how glad I am to share it with artists like Tristan Elwell.

If you enjoy posts like these or if you have ever enjoyed or been inspired by something I have written, and you would like to support this blog, consider buying the author a coffee?

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Happy birthday to my three beloved art books, published in Septembers 2020, 2022, and 2023!

Let’s take a moment to appreciate these visual feasts that explore the mystical, the dark, and the fantastical.

✨ The Art of the Occult: A Visual Sourcebook For The Modern Mystic (2020)
A journey through the esoteric and spiritual in art, from theosophy to sacred geometry. This book showcases how artists have been drawn to the mystical, creating works that transcend time and place.

“The Art of the Occult crosses mystical spheres in a bid to inspire and delight, acting as a light introduction to the art of mysticism.”

✨ The Art of Darkness: A Treasury Of The Morbid, Melancholic & Macabre (2022)
Dive into the shadows with this exploration of how artists have grappled with the darker aspects of the human condition. From the haunting to the horrifying, this book asks: what comfort can be found in facing our demons?

“We deny our inner darkness at our own peril. This book invites us to sit for a while with these shadows – from the safety of our armchairs.”

✨ The Art of Fantasy: A Visual Sourcebook Of All That Is Unreal (2023)
Embark on a magical journey through the realms of imagination. From mermaids to mythical creatures, this book celebrates the fantastical visions that have captivated artists throughout history.

“Our most madcap adventures and extraordinary flights of fancy – this is the fabulous realm of fantasy, and the spectrum of fantastic art is an abundant, richly diverse wonderland to explore.”

These books are more than just curations of art – they’re gateways to other worlds, invitations to explore the depths of human creativity and imagination. Whether you’re drawn to the mystical, the macabre, or the magical, there’s a book in this trio for you.
Find them here or grab a signed copy here and join me in celebrating these weird little art goblins and the windows they open into extraordinary realms!

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In the grey gloaming realm that stretches between the living and the dead, Dylan Garrett Smith’s monochrome reveries unfurl like smoke from a snuffed candle. His artistry is a nocturne played on the bones of forgotten beasts, a serenade to the wild things that lurk just beyond our peripheral vision.

Smith’s canvas is a chiaroscuro otherworld where vitality and decay intertwine in a spectral palimpsest, each layer revealing new depths of existence.

In one haunting tableau, corvids engage in a macabre game of cat’s cradle – or is it shibari? – with a skull, their ebony feathers a stark contrast to the bone’s pallid gleam.

Nearby, a small ram reclines in blissful repose, unaware of the arrows that surround it like a halo of impending doom. This particular piece, a poignant illustration of innocence amidst danger, can be found in my book The Art of Darkness: A Treasury of the Morbid, Melancholic and Macabre.

Suspended in the void, a broken bird’s nest becomes a mobile of bones, dangling precariously and giving dark new meaning to the phrase “cradle to grave.”

A fox bounds away into the darkness, its back turned to us. Its burden, both grisly and beautiful, is revealed: upended skulls serve as macabre baskets, overflowing with phantasmal autumn leaves. This juxtaposition of death and seasonal beauty encapsulates the cyclical nature of existence, a memento mori adorned with life’s fleeting splendor.

In Smith’s hands, a deer skull becomes a temple, its antlers reaching skyward like gothic spires, enrobed in a tapestry of forest flora that speaks of life’s persistence in the face of death.

Elsewhere, rats perform a macabre quadrille, their lithe forms weaving intricate patterns around a juicy pomegranate – a Persephone’s bargain made flesh, the promise of cyclic renewal amidst decay.

I have a fixation on “hands holding things,” and in Dylan Garrett Smith’s hands this obsession finds a dark playground of endless fascination. His monochrome world is populated by a menagerie of spindly, clawed fingers that grasp and clutch at various objects, each image a haunting vignette that pulls at the threads of the subconscious.

In one particularly arresting piece, skeletal hands cradle a guttering candle, its flame a fragile light against encroaching darkness, while rosary drape gently about around the wrists, as if anchoring the soul in its futile quest for salvation.

In another striking image, a snake coils sinuously around an arm, its scales a stark contrast to the human flesh streaked with dark, bleeding veins of dirt. From this liminal fusion of animal and human sprout leaves and berries, as if the arm itself is transforming into a branch, blurring the lines between flesh and flora, predator and prey.

These spectral appendages haunt the penumbral spaces of Smith’s work and our psyche. A wrist pierced by an arrow evokes a pagan stigmata, while elsewhere, a disembodied sorcerer’s hand plays puppeteer to a decaying apple, its fishhook strings a grim reminder of the manipulations that lie beneath life’s surface.

Each eerie hand draws me in, their skeletal digits beckoning me closer, telling stories of grasping desire, occult power, and the ever-present reach of mortality. They speak to something primal, a recognition of hands as tools of creation and destruction,  acting out dark fantasies and ancient rites.

Smith renders these visions in ash, chalk-lead, and ink on black cotton rag, his choice of medium as much a part of the story as the images themselves. The ash speaks of transformation and endings, the chalk-lead whispers of impermanence, while the ink etches permanence into the ephemeral. On the black canvas, these materials come alive, each stroke a revelation of light amidst shadow, of form emerging from void.

This interplay of light and dark extends beyond technique, embodying the very essence of Smith’s artistic philosophy. His work is a meditation on the cycle of life, death, and rebirth, on the beauty found in decay and the inevitability of nature’s reclamation. In Smith’s art, ecological concerns intertwine with occult symbolism, creating a visual language that speaks to both the natural world and the supernatural realms that haunt our collective unconscious.

This shadow play extends beyond the confines of gallery walls and into the pulsing heart of the music world. For over half his life, he’s been weaving his spectral visions into the very fabric of the industry, birthing nearly a thousand designs that clothe the devotees of darkness. From the hallowed racks of Hot Topic to the curated collections of Foxblood, Smith’s creations lurk, waiting to ensnare unsuspecting shoppers in their gossamer threads of ink and imagination.

Throughout his career, his artistry has been embraced by titans of the metal scene, with Smith creating designs for renowned bands whose music shakes our very souls. One can almost hear the eldritch roar of guitars and the seismic percussion echoing through his creations, each design a portal to a concert at the end of the world. “Through these designs,” Smith muses, “many of my favorite artists are now my closest friends.” It’s a testament to the alchemical power of his art, transmuting admiration into connection, fandom into friendship.

He has also lent his talent to the folks at Cadabra Records, where — small world!– I was perusing their website years ago and came across a spoken-word Dracula album, narrated by the one and only Tony Todd. “Hot dog!” I thought, “This is amazing! But wait a second…I recognize the style of this artwork…!” And sure enough, there are several albums in their catalog whose covers are awash in Dylan’s particular brand of darkness.

To stand before a Dylan Garrett Smith piece is to feel the veil between worlds grow gossamer-thin. Time becomes elastic; the boundaries between observer and observed blur. We find ourselves not simply viewing foxes and snakes, skulls and hands, but inhabiting a liminal space where the arcane and the ecological converge.

This is art as ritual, as invocation. Each piece a spell cast against forgetting, against the numbing comfort of artificial light. Smith’s work demands we rekindle our relationship with shadow, with the rich loam of decay that nourishes new life. It whispers of old gods and older truths, of the wisdom found in bone and root and stone.

In an age of ecological crisis, where the wild places shrink beneath our ever-expanding footprint, Smith’s art serves as both warning and balm. It reminds us that nature’s triumph is inevitable, not as a cataclysm to be feared, but as a homecoming to be embraced. To engage with Dylan Garrett Smith’s art is to pilgrimage into the heart of darkness – not as an absence of light, but as a fertile void teeming with possibility.

It is to remember that we, too, are creatures of ash and shadow, of bloom and decay. In his funereal monochrome, we glimpse not just the face of nature, but our own wild souls gazing back, asking to be remembered, to be set free. In Smith’s stark compositions, we find a memento vivere cloaked in the guise of a memento mori – a poignant reminder that in breakdown lies the promise of renewal, in endings, the whisper of beginnings.

Between these poles of existence, Smith reveals the raw, mesmerizing complexity of life’s perpetual cycle.

For all the haunting grimness of his canvases, you’d be hard-pressed to find a more amiable soul than Dylan Garrett Smith.

In my few DMs with him, our conversations have meandered through art and perfume, revealing an artist as relatable as he is talented. Smith’s Instagram offers a window into this duality: interspersed among his spectral creations are posts that showcase a genuine love for his artistic community and a delightfully goofy sense of humor.

I’m particularly fond of his allergy season jokes accompanying some of his woodland flora vignettes – a cheeky reminder that even artists who traffic in the realms of decay and darkness aren’t immune to the prosaic irritations of pollen. This juxtaposition of the macabre and the mundane, the profound and the playful, adds yet another layer of depth to Smith’s already multifaceted persona.

In contemplating Smith’s art, one can’t help but draw parallels to another realm of sensory experience: perfume. Both dark art and fragrance possess the power to evoke visceral reactions, bypassing our logical mind to trigger something primal within us. Like Smith’s meticulously crafted monochrome visions, perfume can transport us to liminal spaces, conjuring the essence of spectral forests and forgotten rituals in an instant. There’s an intimacy to both, a way of getting under the skin and lingering, transforming our perception of the world around us.

In the earthy notes of soil and roots, the metallic tang of blood, or the ethereal whisper of smoke, we find olfactory echoes of Smith’s visual themes – a shared fascination with the cycle of life, death, and rebirth that permeates both art forms. Just as Smith’s hands grasp candles and cradle skulls, certain scents can hold us in their thrall, telling stories of nature’s reclamation and the thin veil between worlds.

I recently inquired with Dylan about his favorites, and he got back to me with the following …

“Since moving to Los Angeles from Pennsylvania a few years ago, I had to completely overhaul my fragrance collection – everything I had was dark, smoky, spicy, and warm for the cooler weather and now that’s it’s like 80 all year long, I’ve had to do some soul searching and branch out, haha!”

Some of my favorites right now:

“Vertical Oud” by Hermetica Paris
“La Capitale” by Xerjoff
“Super Cedar” by Byredo
“Oud Wood” by Tom Ford (author note: ME TOO, IT’S SO GOOD!)
“Woodphoria” by Boy Smells
“Bulletproof” by Tokyomilk Dark
“FFCC33” (“Sunglow”) by Hans Hendley

Also, according to Dylan, “If you’re reading this from Southern California or New England, I have some events and art shows coming up that I’d love to see you at! Check out the Upcoming Events page on my site for more info!”

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