"Feelings Shut Out by the Light" She is always there — standing beside him, just beyond reach. Through the delicate lattice woven by light and shadow, he catches only a faint impression of her presence. Yet the boundary drawn by the shaman he summoned rises between them as a quiet wall. If she could only touch that lattice, she might feel his warmth — but with every step forward, a transparent barrier (kekkai) ripples outward like rings on water, pushing her back toward the edge of the eternal realm. What has been lost is more than distance alone. It is the fulfillment of a nameless longing in the moment it might have touched flesh, and the desperate wish to share the same breath. Inscribed across that endless divide were these words… What you were gazing at was the shape of the love I wished for. I moved my hands, I raised my voice, crossed the edge of the light to be near you. But your eyes answered: "I'm afraid." And someone cast a barrier to seal away my existence. The lattice of light stilled my feet. What you see is only a shadow. But I fell in love with you. ◈ Artist's Note When I began creating this piece, the feeling that lived in my mind was a longing that cannot reach — a bittersweet ache with nowhere to land. She yearned for the world of the living and wanted to touch him, yet could not cross the physical divide no matter how hard she tried. I wanted to frame that frustration not as a mere landscape, but as a single scene cut from something close to a drama. The element I was most conscious of while composing the image was the boundary that lies between the woman and the man. She thinks of him and keeps trying to draw near — but a barrier erected by a spirit medium stands in her way. To give that barrier form, I deliberately chose a grid of light running in vertical lines. What I was most particular about during the process was the contrast between the woman's silhouette and the lattice itself. Part of her dissolves into the light; the rest remains as shadow. By sharpening her outline in some places and softening it into a gentle blur in others, I wanted to express not that she is fully there, but that she exists and yet cannot fully be touched — an uncanny, in-between presence. I also gave careful attention to the film-grain noise layered across the entire image and the subtle shifts in texture throughout. This is not mere decoration — it is a treatment meant to evoke the atmosphere (kuuki-kan) of the moment when the physical world and the spiritual world bleed into one another. By leaving things just slightly out of focus, I hoped to deepen the faint sorrow in her expression. The poem attached to the work carries the inner voice of her heart. To him, she may appear as nothing more than a shadow. But before she became that shadow — how fiercely she wished, how much courage she gathered before crossing the edge of the light. I would be glad if viewers could feel that weight of longing that sight alone cannot fully carry. For everyone who looks at this piece, I hope it leaves a quiet opening — a sense that she, on the other side of this lattice (this barrier), is still watching you, gently and without a word. ◈ Edition This work is a limited-edition, one-of-a-kind giclée print from the Mystique In Enigma series. ◈ Keywords Light / Grid / Spirit / Boundary / Love / Shadow / Barrier / Memory / Digital Art / Fine Art / Mystique / Solitude