That's my interpretation anyway, or as best as I can do with words right now. I could be missing something important or I'm reading too much into it, I dunno. I just really love the painting and it sparks my imagination whenever I see it!

Not to mention something I love about lots of Whelan's work: how the background fades into the distance. The faint cloudiness gives these paintings a great sense of scale. It reminds you of the sheer size of the world you can explore. Even the size of the shrine itself is also arresting, I think.

There is nothing hostile here, and it seems like it could be very relaxing. But I also think there could equally be a sense of unease. The POV is exactly how far away you can get before you're over some threshold, moving any closer means *something* will irrevocably change for better or worse.

But, if that's the case, what about the stepping stones at the bottom? They're clearly not built like the avatar itself, maybe just taken from the beach, or from the ruins of the shrine. Maybe someone is still here, revering what this place used to mean.

The fact there's no people here (apart from maybe the floating orbs...) adds to that idea of discovery. I sometimes think of it as a POV, *I* am a character in the painting, finding this place for the first time in countless centuries.

It's serene, and yet finding it fills your mind with questions: Who built it? What was it used for? Does it still work, or is the magic gone? How did such a civilisation fall and why was this abandoned afterwards? I start to rebuild this place and imagine what it was like when it was first made.

On the GM's turn, the GM wears a silly hat. On the player's turn, they all wear silly hats and take theirs off once their turn is over.

One positive of the day: the nice Sainsbury's guy who I haven't seen in a while delivered my shop today. That's perked me up a little.