A diptych gives an artist a distinctive challenge. Each panel needs to stand on its own, but together the two sides should become something more. For Trekell Pro Team Artist Danica Sills, that challenge became an opportunity to explore life, death and the visual relationships that connect them.
Diptychs have appeared in art for centuries, and their divided format offers more than a decorative alternative to a single rectangular surface. The space between the panels becomes part of the composition. It can create contrast, movement, symbolism and an invitation for the viewer to compare one side with the other.
For her Trekell Limited Edition Diptych Panel, Danica drew from medieval imagery and one of the recurring themes in her work: Memento Mori. One panel represents life through a woman. The other represents death through a skeleton. Viewed together, the two figures become part of one larger story.
Watch Danica’s diptych painting process below.
Start with the Relationship Between the Panels
Before Danica began painting, she decided that the two sides needed to feel connected through balance and symmetry.
“I love symmetrical, balanced paintings, so early on I decided to mirror the two panels,” she says.
Danica began by designing the woman on one panel, then mirrored her placement onto the second panel so she could design the skeleton with similar proportions and posture.
Both figures lean slightly toward one another. That subtle movement creates a connection across the center divide and guides the viewer’s eye from one side of the diptych to the other.
Rather than fully completing one side before beginning the other, Danica developed both sketches at the same time. After establishing the main forms of the woman and skeleton, she continued refining both drawings together so they remained at a similar level of finish.
Use Value to Create Balance
Symmetry was not the only tool Danica used to connect the two sides. Before painting, she created a value study for the complete diptych.
“It was really important to me for the two sides to be visually balanced, and values were the second tool that I used to achieve that, after the overall composition,” Danica says.
Value helps connect a multi-panel artwork even when the subjects differ. The largest areas of light and dark, the placement of contrast and the overall visual weight of each side can make the work feel balanced as a whole.
For artists working across multiple surfaces, it helps to step back regularly and view the panels together. Each piece should work individually, but the larger value structure needs to support the full composition.
Let Each Side Tell Part of the Story
Danica describes Memento Mori as one of her artistic obsessions, making the Diptych Panel a natural surface for this particular painting.
One side represents life through the woman. The other represents death through the skeleton.
“I wanted each side to feel complete in itself, but by viewing them together it becomes a story of the flow of life to death,” Danica explains.
She wanted the relationship between the two panels to feel comforting rather than frightening. Above the figures, a sun and moon continue the idea of connected opposites.
“You can’t have life without death, day without night. I find that to be so beautiful,” she says.
The two panels do not simply present opposing subjects. Each side gives the other more meaning.
Use the Space Between Panels
With a diptych, the physical gap between the panels becomes part of the artwork. It creates a division, but it can also create a visual connection when the composition is designed intentionally.
Danica used several cues to lead the viewer across that center space. The woman and skeleton look toward one another. Their figures mirror each other in posture and placement. Their forms lean inward, encouraging the eye to move back and forth between the two panels.
She also repeated related design elements across the painting. The woman’s hair and the skeleton’s scarf are not identical, but they share a similar flow and visual weight.
These visual echoes help the two panels feel connected without making them exact copies.
Danica also used the surrounding frame as part of the larger idea.
“I love that the frame provides a third place to continue building out the idea of the whole painting,” she says.
Look to Art History for Inspiration
The diptych format was not Danica’s only connection to historical art. Medieval and Renaissance imagery became an important source of inspiration as she developed the piece.
“Medieval and Renaissance art was so inspiring to me while working on this painting,” Danica says. “It’s a period in art history that really exemplifies the themes that I love to put in my art.”
Skeletons are a recurring motif in medieval art, especially in imagery connected to mortality. Danica knew immediately that a skeleton belonged in her diptych.
Color also connected the painting to the past. Danica was inspired by the historical importance of ultramarine blue, a rare and highly valued pigment in Renaissance painting.
She used a soft blue sky in each panel as a nod to that history and to the value artists have placed on blue across centuries of painting.
Rather than recreating historical artwork, Danica borrowed the subjects, symbols and colors that connected with the themes she already loves to explore.
Think of a Diptych as Three Compositions
For Danica, a Diptych Panel sits between a single painting and a series of paintings.
“This Diptych Panel feels like the perfect marriage between a single painting and a series of paintings,” she says.
Her process begins with the full image. She first considers how the two panels will work as a single composition. Then she focuses on each side as its own individual painting.
The result is what Danica describes as a harmonious third image. The left panel has its own visual interest. The right panel has its own visual interest. Together, they create another reading of the work that neither side could create alone.
Let the Surface Give You Boundaries
A standard rectangular panel offers an open field with relatively few built-in compositional restrictions. A diptych introduces an immediate boundary through the division between the two panels.
For Danica, that boundary is not a limitation. It is part of what makes the surface creatively useful.
“It’s often said that adding restraints to the art process can lead to a more creative outcome. That’s what I think of with this panel,” she says.
The question changes from simply asking, “What should I paint?” to asking, “What could happen between these two spaces?”
That structure can lead artists toward ideas involving contrast, balance, time, transformation, memory, relationships or any concept that benefits from being seen in two parts.
Start with a List of Ideas
If you are looking at a blank diptych and are unsure what to paint, Danica recommends beginning away from the easel.
“Honestly, I’m a huge list maker,” she says. “I often start paintings with a list of ideas in the form of words.”
Start by writing down the first ideas that could be explored in two parts. Think about the passage of time, complementary colors, balance and imbalance, life and death, memory and change, or another relationship that interests you.
Then add more ideas that branch outward from the first list. Look for unexpected connections that still feel rooted in the subjects and themes you already enjoy painting.
“I love this method to come up with new ideas,” Danica says. “It helps me find new connections that are still rooted in the things I already love to paint.”
How Danica Prepared the Panel
Once Danica finalized her drawing, she transferred the sketch to the Diptych Panel using graphite on the back of the paper.
She then used workable fixative to seal the transferred drawing before applying three layers of clear acrylic gesso.
Using clear acrylic gesso allowed Danica to prepare the surface for painting without covering the drawing underneath. From there, she built the finished piece using Golden SoFlat and Holbein Acryla Gouache.
The Takeaway
A diptych does not have to be one painting simply divided in half. It can be two individual compositions in conversation with one another.
Danica’s painting works because she considered that relationship from the beginning. Mirrored figures establish balance. Values connect the compositions. Repeated shapes carry the eye across the divide. Life responds to death. The sun responds to the moon. Two individual paintings become a third image when viewed together.
If you want to create a diptych of your own, do not begin by asking what belongs on the left and what belongs on the right.
Start by asking what two ideas belong together.
Tools Danica Used
- Trekell Limited Edition Diptych Panel
- Trekell Crimson Taklon Synthetic Brushes
- Golden SoFlat Acrylic Paint
- Holbein Acryla Gouache
- Graphite for transferring the drawing
- Workable Fixative
- Clear Acrylic Gesso
