Table of Contents

About the Grotesque

(Answers to "Pearl", "Night", "Pearlknight", Sanguine and anything about intimate relations with the undead...)

I am Pearlnight, but you can call me Pearl. I'm an autistic queer and webcomic author since the winter of 2021. My primary work is the webcomic Dancing with the Dead, it's a 1970's period piece and my love-letter to the vampire genre.

Besides drawing the comic I dwell in the quieter crevices of the web, play obscure computer games and dust off old sites with the company of my fellow creatures. My art is derived from my love of darkness, my experiences with mental illness and my own repressed feelings. I invite you to interpret me through my pieces; and make of me as you will.

About this Lair

I made Pearlnight's Lair in July 2021. I used a static site-builder at the time, as I wasn't confident with HTML and needed a place to throw ideas at. Two years later, I tired of this dampening effect on my creativity and finally switched to manual coding. I flayed it half a dozen times, but now it's mine! In its current form, this is my personal haunt, library, and link collection. I experiment in ways too damned confusing to put on a changelog, but once new pages arrive, they stick just fine.

Design Tenets of the Lair

It doesn't demand your attention with constant updates, live-feeds or whatever "thing of the month" I want to feature. Instead I want you to dare I say, enter freely and at your own will. Eventually it will serve as my digital resting place, as a post-mortem echo of everything I've been. You do not know me, and I do not know you, but I hope its humble darkness can soothe your weary bones.

FAQ

"Can I use your code?"

My goodness, please! Hardly a morsel of this code even belongs to me! Of course you can use it! Do keep in mind that this layout is by Kalechips, not myself.

"Do you do commissions?"

No, I don't need the money. However, I buy plenty from my best friend Lutzbug. They're a stunningly good artist; quick turn-around times, reasonable prices and the skills to make the wait worthwhile.

"How can I contact you?

I am not to be reached right now. Comments are welcome in the meantime, if you're on Neocities.

"How did you start coding?"

DeviantART's custom boxes, they're dearly missed. This arcane tongue lied dormant for years until I learned about Neocities in late 2019. Discovering it and the Small/Indie/Eensy-Weensy Web is the best accidental discovery I've ever made.

"What does your name mean?"

It's a word I use to describe Blue Hour, which is emotionally meaningful to me. I love the night in general. I find black a blank canvas for all sorts of phantasmagoria, but Blue Hour exists with a spark of magic. When every Blue Hour happens, I become a part of the pre-dawn haze, a fantastical glittering thing. I will always love living in a Blue Hour. Even if it pours past my fingers into yet another dawn. Even if all I can do is trap it in a name, like a letter in a bottle.

"What happened to some of your other projects?"

Back in 2021, I was going to write a Vampire Review blog called "Fangs a Lot!". This was exclusively for movies, but I only managed one review before the reality of Drawing A Webcomic set in. In short, Dancing with the Dead cannibalised its kin and all I could do was stand there and watch. At one point I made a webring, but I gave it to one of its members and went off to do some other things. While it's highly unlikely that you'll recall these, this bit's been on my FAQ for years and I like being transparent about these things.

"What sites inspired you?"

When I started this project, I was most inspired by The Tower. I still love the way it looks, but its compact design works better for simpler sites. After all the redesigns, I turned my attentions to Etymonline and the Phronistery.

They're sophisticated (for their time-periods) but still very clearly dated. They genuinely strive to be readable, but the Phronistery's airbrushed logo and grainy low-contrast textures clash with its flat-coloured body section in this fascinating way. It wants to be frilly and formal, but it betrays itself with this endearingly janky graphic design. My site does strive to have more visual harmony than this, but the contrast between well-sourced information and old-web asymmetry is one I'll always hold very close to my heart.

See also