Tijs Dragtsma (1992) - A Moon Devoured by Wings

A full moon hangs alone in a black field, and from one side a swarm has closed over it. A Moon Devoured by Wings catches the moment the dark has already taken more than half the light and is still moving, advancing in the shape of wings across a bright, cratered sphere.

What remains lit is a field of fine scratches, taken from the surface of the acrylic glass rather than added to it. Up close the surface resolves into a field of individual marks, controlled scratches that gather and hold the light. From a distance those same marks become a single glowing moon, its face scarred with craters, its edge eaten away by a tide of small, dark shapes.

A Moon Devoured by Wings belongs to Painted Out, a series within Art with Scratch by Tijs Dragtsma in which imagery is constructed through controlled surface damage rather than pigment or print, and in which that same damage becomes a way of asking what still holds its light while something larger closes in around it.

No paint. No print. No ink. The image sits in the surface of the acrylic glass and is always present, with or without direct light. Light does not create it here. It sharpens it, deepens the contrast between the swarm and the glow it is swallowing, and lets the work read differently depending on where you stand, without ever losing its shape.

The moon in this work is not failing, it is being claimed, one curve at a time, by something darker and more numerous than itself. A crescent of pure light still holds at the far edge, untouched, the last bright argument against the wings closing over it. That sliver carries the real weight of the image: it is what makes the loss visible, and what makes it matter.

It is not hard to recognise this shape in a life. A mood that spreads until only one bright thought still stands, a silence that grows until just one sentence still gets through. A Moon Devoured by Wings asks quietly where your own last bright edge is, and how long it has left.

"Even the moon is not safe from the dark. It only shines longer."

About Art with Scratch

Art with Scratch is a body of work in which the image is not drawn, but released. Carved line by line into a deep black surface, each work emerges through countless precise scratches that catch the light and bring form out of darkness.

From a distance, the image appears almost photographic. Powerful, recognisable and full of presence. Yet up close, the work dissolves into a dense field of individual marks. Fine, fragile and almost weightless. What seemed solid reveals itself as a delicate web of lines, each one a deliberate gesture, each one essential to the whole.

Light does not create the image. It sharpens it. The black surface absorbs, while the scratched lines reflect. As light shifts across the surface, the image breathes. From one angle the figure stands clear and defined. From another it softens and settles back toward the darkness from which it came, without ever disappearing. Under a focused spotlight, the contrast deepens and the image takes on a sculptural, almost luminous quality.

What makes this medium so compelling is its quiet tension. The act of scratching is direct and irreversible. Every line is a decision that cannot be undone. Yet the result is not harsh. It is intimate, atmospheric and alive with movement. Hardness becomes softness. Destruction becomes creation. Absence becomes presence.

In works such as this portrait, the figure is never fully fixed. Through the interplay of line, light and shadow, the image shifts with perspective and atmosphere. At certain moments, the subject seems to step forward out of the black. At others, it settles back into stillness. It is within that movement, between sharpness and calm, that the work comes alive.

Like all materials touched by time, the surface carries its own quiet life. Each scratch holds a moment, a breath, a gesture. Together they form not just an image, but a presence, one that continues to reveal itself with every change of light.

About the Artist

My name is Tijs Dragtsma, founder of TD Fine Art Studio.

As an artist, I am driven by a constant desire to explore new visual languages. I do not see art as a fixed style, but as an evolving field of discovery where material, structure, light and emotion come together.

My work often begins with a simple question. How can a material speak in a new way. How can hardness become intimacy. How can precision create emotion. That search lies at the heart of everything I create.

Within TD Fine Art Studio, each body of work is approached as its own world, with its own logic, atmosphere and visual identity. Some works are built through rhythm, repetition and structure. Others emerge through absence, shadow, reflection or tension. What connects them is a shared commitment to originality, clarity and emotional presence.

I am fascinated by contrast. Between strength and fragility. Between control and feeling. Between what is visible and what is left open to interpretation. My goal is not simply to make an image, but to create a work that holds attention, invites reflection and continues to reveal itself over time.

TD Fine Art Studio is the space in which these explorations come together. It is not only a studio, but an evolving artistic universe shaped by curiosity, precision and the ambition to create work that feels distinctive, intentional and alive.

This listing contains AI-generated visualisations. Please refer to the original photographs to assess the actual condition of the object.