"It's just that sometimes you feel, all too poignantly, that your life is over. You're not even thirty, but you're done. Not dead, but burnt through...and there's nothing ahead for you."

Lara Ravel from Pathologic 2. Study based on a painting by Malcolm Liepke. 

I wanted to paint her half fading into the darkness before her, with few hard borders between her and the dark background. I think I achieved that aspect decently (despite her light shirt) in her hair and clothing, with her face standing out in very quiet, reserved despair. I wanted to capture the sense of profound isolation I get from her in-game - the fear that there is nothing of value left to you and your life is a slow and steady descent into meaningless annihilation, with no help or relief coming. The acid yellow tones feel right. Waxy and sickly, they highlight the gross fact of inhabiting a living body with all its demands when you're hardly sure you even want to live at all.