Carpe Noctem (Seize the Night !)

The night does not truly exist… it is but an illusion, a space between two lights, a pause before a star ignites once more. Even in the deepest darkness, there is always a hidden glimmer…

The painting “Carpe Noctem” invites the viewer to explore the mysteries and beauty of night, not as a mere period of darkness, but as a realm in its own right—a world where the boundaries of reality dissolve and the invisible comes alive. The title, a play on the Latin aphorism “Carpe Diem” (Seize the present day!), is deliberately transformed here to poetically capture the time of night, an invitation to embrace the profound and mysterious dimension of darkness, to fully live it, to uncover its subtleties, and savor its intensity.

Through this artwork, I sought to capture the might and serenity of the night. The interplay between light and shadow, a key element in this painting, suggests that within the darkness of night, there is a hidden light—a luminous presence that emerges from the shadows.

Deep hues intertwine with vivid colors, emphasizing the idea that night is not the absence of light, but a different kind of light—more subtle, more internal. Night thus represents a time of awakening and revelation, where the boundaries between the tangible world and the invisible dissipate. The motif of shadow, often perceived as menacing or frightening, becomes here a metaphor for the search for oneself, a fertile ground where dream and reality merge into a single experience.

In this sense, “Carpe Noctem” urges us to question our relationship to darkness and light. The night, as depicted here, becomes an invitation to dive into the hidden corners of our consciousness, to accept what we do not know or fear, and to find its beauty. It is a hymn to introspection, to the silent wisdom that darkness can offer, far from the bustle of day.

This painting encourages us to reconsider our vision of the nocturnal world, to understand that even in the deepest darkness, there exists a light waiting to be discovered, like a multicolored nebula shining brilliantly at the heart of a cosmos tinged with night.