Stacey Ewald

The Allure of Darkness

From childhood, we are taught to fear the dark, a primal instinct reinforced by ghost stories and the unknown. However, I have always found myself drawn to its enigmatic embrace. I am captivated by the ‘dark side’ in art, literature, and film. Even now, amidst the often difficult realities reflected in news and media, I remain pulled toward its undeniable power. Darkness is not just a landscape of danger and uncertainty, but a place of silence and contemplation, of romance and intimacy, and of unexpected beauty where the familiar fades and the unexpected blooms. It is where our instinctive fear of the unknown clashes with a deeper curiosity. We are wired to seek clarity and predictability, yet darkness offers something else: a fertile space for imagination and emotional depth.

My work explores the lyrical power of darkness not to obscure it but to transform. The images are reimagined through shadow and absence. Within this darkness, perception slows, allowing for a closer look and a new kind of engagement, one that reveals hidden truths, sparks mystery, and offers the possibility of finding unexpected warmth in its resonant atmosphere. This is an invitation to embrace the allure of darkness, to challenge the ingrained fear and to discover what lies within the velvety rich shadows.

Artist Bio

Stacey Ewald is a New York based photographic artist, born and raised in Brooklyn, whose work is charged with emotion, mystery, and beauty. Quietly cinematic and painterly, her photographs are intimate visual poems that capture intense stillness and moments suspended in time. Light and shadow become both subject and atmosphere, illuminating or deepening the silence, fleeting traces, and the ephemeral.

Stacey studied with photographer Palmer Davis, and at the International Center of Photography and the School of Visual Arts. In 2024, she was the recipient, along with six other artists, of an Arts Westchester grant and exhibited her work at the Arts Westchester Gallery in White Plains, NY. Her work has also been exhibited in several group shows in Larchmont and Rye, NY.

She currently lives in Larchmont, NY, where she shares her life with her husband, two children, and their puppy.