I keep having this pervasive thought.

The idea of explaining the imagery in Gravend haunts me.

I have always come to the canvas with the intention of creating scary images. However, the nature of the world that I am drawing is becoming clear.

Gravend takes place in a world where edges do not sharpen. Light does not coalesce and shadows do not obscure.

I have limited my palette in a way which removes a great deal of contrast, so they are uniformly muted. However, the subject matter remains… Concerning.

The nature of the enemies is as unclear as their silhouette. Are they singular? Legion? Embodied? Possessed? As ever, it depends on the creature, but many of those answers are left purposely vague.

For it is the nature of the protagonist that is the most strange. And yet, I feel, it is the most true to the experience which a video game character would have.

The protagonist is not directly gendered, though they do look deteriorated both in shape and spirit. The game requires them to die and be reborn. Their first life is a refusal to stay dead and their first death is unavoidable.

For what is a video game than a life generator? Respawning as a refusal to die and marching directly back into the fight which killed them in order to die once more. For to respawn is to taste immortality.

The player character in any video game may be immortal, but the player in Gravend remembers their past lives along with the human. The human player provides the spark of consciousness for the machine, and this game allows continuation of the past through death.

The job system is a game mechanic, but for me, it is a way for the protagonist to remember the past and future without breaking the fourth wall. Peeking behind the curtain, the character can be what they were or remember what will be. For what is death, than the possibility of forbidden knowledge? What is birth than a forgetting?

I intentionally resist using references in the images in order to manifest a feeling of dreaming. I aim to create a symbology that is visible through surreal impressions.

Regardless of what gets communicated successfully, the evidence of human touch gives the artwork a texture rarely seen in this year of our lord 2025. Nothing is smoothed, yassified or filtered. It is the computer used as tool instead of creator.

I am reluctant to admit this, but I am not a player of Gravend. I am its dreamer. Walking through the worlds I make from the vantage point of a viewer is uncomfortable for me.

I say that so I may explain why I have a task for you. Walk through my images for me. Multiply their meanings through new eyes. Provide the spark of consciousness which will enliven the machine. Without players, the game will truly die. Without viewers, the art may have never been made.

But through participation, the protagonist lives. Through viewing, the art becomes your own.

So please, tell me what you see.