“I’ve always found something beautiful in melancholy,” illustrator Owen Gent explains. Films, music, and artwork that has affected him the most has had this quality, and it’s a sentiment that he produces in his own illustrations. The ethereal images depict characters confronting something within themselves, for better or for worse. Some appear enlightened, as if they a breaking through (literally) an emotional barrier and moving to the other side. Other figures, often faceless, don’t fare as well and seem more alone than they once did. These are the ones we can identify with the most; it’s as if they are inviting us to occupy their bodies with our own sadness.

Images © Owen Gent