Why does the paintress paint at all? (Spoiler warning)

[DerSchuki]

I've finished the game now. I've understood who is who and why and why not. At least I think so :). What I'm missing... maybe I missed something and didn't listen properly: Why does the paintress paint the numbers at all? What would have happened to everyone at 0? Especially with Maelle?

[Rai]

She's not the one causing the gommages it's real renoir, both of them are trapped in the monolith and the number she paints is a warning for the people of lumiere since renoir is still strong enough to erase the oldest generations and she can't stop him.

She's the one keeping everyone alive, thats why when you beat her everyone gets gommaged at the end of act 2. Because real renoir gets freed

[Inf]

She paints the numbers to let her creations know who she can't save anymore. Renoir (with Clea's Nevrons) is slowly winning the war, so each year she doesn't have enough power to keep them all alive and the Gommage comes to take them

[Misa]

clea said to alicia that she made it so that chroma couldn't return to Aline, that's why her power to protect from the gommage gradually wanes.

[DerSchuki]

Oh wow, it seems i missed that part. Now it makes sense. Thanks.

[Lily Valesti]

Aline, the paintress, wants to keep the canvas and (real) Verso's memory and creations alive, whereas Renoir wants to get rid of it so his family can move on and grieve Verso's death. Like someone mentioned, the numbers ticking down each year portray the age of those she can still save, and those she can no longer. Those above this age line are released by Renoir through the gommage - that is, Curator Renoir, not painted Renoir - whom had a different goal entirely, and wanted to protect Aline which is why we were constantly fighting him, and why he was himself gommaged by real Renoir (Curator).

[Kapika96]

She's stronger than Renoir, but thanks to Clea's intervention can't replenish chroma. So every year she gets weaker and Renoir is able to destroy more of her creations, starting with the oldest ones. She paints the number as a warning, they'll gommage regardless, she's just trying to give a heads up to tell them it's their last year.

[Ringlet]

Let me quote myself from another thread.

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It actually explained in the letter from Alicia that Verso sit reading at the harbor. But back then, the context of the letter was hardly comprehensible by the player, because player didn't yet grasp the REAL concept of the world player has been experienced with.

Additionally, the letter often used just the word HE and SHE to refer (the real) Renoir and (the real) Aline, that made it more confusing to understand the context.

Here's a few lines mentioned in the letter.

"On her Monolith, she paints a warning for us all. Of the few she can save as her power wanes"

"You mother paints life. Whilst your father, death."