The Promise is a personal homage to Arnold Böcklin’s Isle of the Dead, reimagined through the surreal and symbolic lens that defines my recent work. The distant funerary island—its rocky formations and solemn cypress trees—echoes Böcklin’s original vision, yet here it is suspended in an ambiguous space, detached from both time and place.

Balanced on two organic supports that suggest both fragility and poise, one half of a mask or human face rests below, its expression inscrutable. The deep red cradle bearing the landscape above seems to gaze quietly outward, a witness to the scene’s stillness.

By abstracting Böcklin’s imagery, The Promise invites reflection on loss and the delicate, uncertain structures that sustain memory and meaning.