[CR] Escaping Time

Watercolor on 35x25cm paper. November 21, 2018.

It was an afternoon like any other, he left work and went to the store in the neighborhood to get what he needed to prepare dinner. The merchant greets him kindly, grabs everything he needs and points on a shelf of candy some and asks the store owner to add it with the rest of the things

Outside the store, an icy wind brushes his throat and seems to stab into him like a dagger. That cold reminds him that a family member also needs provisions for his dinner. Goes back to the store and sees the man placing the last padlock on the old metal grid. He will have to go somewhere else.

The temperature descended to the rhythm of daylight and without realizing the black sky had won. Shivering, thinks about coping with the winter night taking shortcuts. He enters streets that are unknown to him but in his memory, they affirm that will take him to the desired place.

This is how he reaches an alley, gloomy and desolate; Mix of dirty and forgotten. He sees lights on but everything is silent. Feels footsteps in the distance, echoes without an owner; a premonition of the past.

Follows a trace on the ground, he needs to raise his eyes even further to follow it, it extends to the end of the block. In the end, a flash that attracts and repels; It brings curious beings closer and distances them from the future.

That shine has an origin, a scepter in the hands of Death, a sinister creature, like the memories that he wants to leave behind and now they return in this narrow shortcut.

Breathes deeply at the feel that, from that empty skull, something holds his gaze.

It's the time that always goes ahead of us and without realizing it, it reaches us.

 
I wanted to make this illustration for Halloween but time (coincidentally) did not allow it.

Dark colors in watercolor is something that I always debate how to carry them out, while I was writing this story, I read the comic Batman: Europa, painted fantastically in watercolors, and I was surprised that the artists were inclined to use this technique with lighter colors than those that are common to Batman style, that inspired me to try other ways to represent the night. I ended up trying violet tones.

 
I deepened the colors until I darkened the figure enough to stand out from the background and added shadows.

I hope you liked it!