Shadow Work (The Eclipse Within) 🔴 SOLD

Oil, acrylic and gold leaf on cradled wooden birch panel, 55x30x3cm,
Shadow Work (The Eclipse Within) explores the meeting point between the self we reveal and the self we keep hidden.
Two jaguars face one another across an eclipse: one illuminated and familiar, the other a rare black melanistic jaguar emerging from darkness. They can be read as two aspects of the same being , the conscious self and the shadow self , brought face to face.
In Jungian psychology, the shadow represents the parts of ourselves that exist beyond the light of conscious awareness: instincts, fears, desires, wounds and qualities we may suppress or refuse to recognise. Shadow work is not about destroying this darkness, but acknowledging and integrating it. The black jaguar therefore isn’t an adversary. It is the unseen self asking to be recognised.
Between them hangs the eclipse, a moment when light and darkness cease to behave as opposites and temporarily occupy the same space. It becomes a symbol of integration: darkness does not extinguish the light, nor does light eradicate darkness. One reveals the other.
The jaguar itself has long been associated across cultures of the Americas with power, transformation, night and the ability to move between worlds. Here, the two animals become guardians of opposing realms , the golden, illuminated world and the celestial darkness beyond it, meeting at a threshold between the visible and invisible.
Shadow Work (The Eclipse Within) is ultimately about turning towards rather than away, recognising that wholeness does not come from remaining permanently in the light, but from having the courage to meet what waits for us in the dark…