Tales of Mystery and Imagination by Edgar Allan Poe 1923

Harry Clarke conjured this otherworldly illustration for Edgar Allan Poe’s *Tales of Mystery and Imagination*. Look at the way he's built up the image, line by painstaking line. Can you imagine the patience and precision it would take to create this image? It’s as if he's weaving a web of intrigue, mirroring Poe's own labyrinthine narratives. The stark contrast and intricate detail are so striking! It is balanced delicately between horror and beauty, darkness and light. I'm thinking about that figure draped in shadows, that harlequin-like figure, and the way Clarke uses these bold, dark, diamond shapes. The figure seems lost in some bizarre reverie, surrounded by rats. I mean, what's going on in their head? How did Clarke tap into the collective unconscious? Maybe he found that space that we all share, where we all find our strangest dreams, too. This image is like a portal— a nod to art history, too. Aren't we all just remixing and sampling the same old human themes in new ways? We painters are all in this ongoing dialogue, an exchange of ideas across time, inspiring each other.