Beauty has always been treated as something to be admired—something pure, delicate, and worthy of love. I wanted to question that illusion. In my interpretation of Beauty and the Beast, the beast is not standing beside beauty. She is waiting behind it. The mirror is not a curse or a portal; it is honesty. It reflects the emotions we bury beneath carefully constructed appearances—our anger, fear, jealousy, grief, desire, and every instinct society teaches us to conceal. The rose glowing through the stained glass is the last reminder of the fairy tale we were taught. Yet the real story unfolds in the reflection, where beauty and monstrosity are revealed as two inseparable halves of the same soul. To me, the beast isn’t evil. She is simply the part of ourselves that refuses to be ignored. This painting is about accepting that every beautiful face carries unseen shadows, and every monster was once something vulnerable. Because the most terrifying reflection isn’t the one that changes… It’s the one that finally tells the truth.