Filed under: Botany in Wonderland
If you gaze into the beetle long enough, you might be able to see them. Medium: acrylic on board. I’ll be back from vacation early next week and will return to posting paintings based on the nonsense of celebrity gossip. Coming soon: Paris Hilton, Janice Dickinson and the Demented Food Chipmunk!
Posted by 14 ♦ March 30, 2007
At 1:14 pm Demon Kitty said:
I love interstellar beetles. Hope you enjoy the rest of your vacation! Gotta go look “bodhi” up in the dictionary.
March 30, 2007
At 4:47 pm Viper Tetsu said:
God knows I love your gossip goodies, and I’ll probably get clocked upside the head by many of my fellow GOTA fans, but…
Take your time going back to Gossip World, Genius Girl. I, for one, am happy–nay, giddy as the proverbial English schoolgirl–for the extended visit to Botany Wonderland.
March 30, 2007
At 10:00 pm 1..1 said:
what am i supposed to see? i see a girl in a beetle, is that it or is there something else??
great painting though
March 30, 2007
At 3:04 am Idiot Celebrities Blog said:
Great art! I love the ironic renderings of the celebrities and the cultural references… keep up the great work!
March 31, 2007
At 6:46 am the domestic minx said:
Calling occupants of interplanetary craft - or interstellar Bodhi Beetles..
Beam me up Scotty!
I love your craft x
March 31, 2007
At 12:39 pm alicia said:
beautifull!!!
March 31, 2007
14
At 11:12 am 14 said:
thanks for the comments everyone. 1 .. 1, you see a girl in a beetle and I see a mystical priest with aliens in his robe. I’m slightly insane though.
xoxo
14
April 1, 2007
At 7:33 pm jerkygirl said:
When I looked at this the first thing I thought of were the Talosians from the episode in Star Trek when Spock hijacked Christopher Pike and took him back to Talos IV after he was in an accident. Weird coincidence, or do I just watch too much Star Trek?
I think I like this one best of all.
P.S. I still want to know why the 5 of hearts is your favorite card!!!
April 1, 2007
At 9:45 am SJK222 said:
You may get more comments on Paris’ tush, but I like these better. Thanks for sharing all your work!
April 2, 2007
janet planet
At 5:26 pm janet planet said:
14, I stared at this painting for a long time and literally felt myself falling into it. Very cool.
April 2, 2007
At 1:56 pm Noelegy said:
Will you be offering these as prints? They are gorgeous. I particularly like the colors in this one.
April 3, 2007
At 3:47 pm Adam Smith said:
Carl Jung in his formulation of the theory of synchronicity,(the acausal linking of significant events, by means that could not be explained by normal causality), uses a Scarab beetle as an example of how seemingly unrelated events can be connected when viewed in the proper context.
These idea of synchroncity came to him throuh a single event, that shaped the whole orientation of the thesis.
He was treating a female patient who was intractable in her rational, materialistic, matter of fact picture of the world.
For her, artefacts of the unconscious with their attendant numinous implications had very little resonance or real meaning.
It was very difficult for Jung to get her to see beyond this limited proscribed worldview.
Whilst in a session with this patient she related the story of a dream she had in which she was handed a golden scarab beetle.
At that moment Jung became aware of a gentle tapping at the window,turning around he saw a scarab beetle trying to enter the room via the window.
This particular kind of Beetle is an ancient Egyption symbol of rebirth. Subsesquent sessions saw a change in the patient’s outlook, allowing for a greater expression of feeling and thought, outside the narrow confines of her previous existence. This can be interpreted as the dream signalling to her, a need to look beyond her previous perspective, with the real beetle actively presaging this change.
By integrating her old and new selves she could be said to have experienced a rebirth of sorts.
Bhodi refers to the Bhudda’s realisation of the true nature of reality, with the concomitant breaking free from the chains of Samsara. In mythological terms this is of course another form of rebirth.
The face in the centre seems influenced by the mask one see’s in Japanese Noh theatre.
Through the use of lighting,positioning with reference to the other players and other visual artifice, a single mask can portray numerous archetypal emotions.
This either represents the many sided facets of an individual’s character, or the way we take on many persona’s in different social contexts, depending on the framework which one uses to interpret this symbolism.This could also be interpreted theologically as the many faces of God.
14 also refers to the being in the picture as a priest, who are of course percieved by many, as agents of spiritual transformation.
Finally the picture is called “Interstellar Bodhi Beetle”. The transcendent elements of space travel hardly need underlining, especially at a time when our existence here seems so under threat. It is also no surprise that this theme would be used by an artist working on the West coast, where the Western mind has reached the limits of it’s spatial expansion. This is the place where much of the pop-culture representation of Alien worlds and Sci-Fi is produced, “to infinity and beyond”.
Very interesting.
Fourteen, you are an excellent antenna for your culture’s geist.
A quick note to Viper Tetsu. I hope you’re spreading the Fuckmuppet meme as far and wide as possible, I won’t be satified until I turn on “The Wire” and hear someone using the expression. Brandon Davis using it in some vile tirade would be a dissapointment. But you can’t control these things, so I would’nt hold you personally responsible.
I would shy away from terms like “giddy as the proverbial English schoolgirl” though.
I live a few blocks away from a Girls School in London. Every morning, on their way to school the air is filled with “fucking this and fucking that”, and the continual use of a particular
Anglo Saxon word that is offensive to many Lesbians and Feminists of the oldschool.
Giddy they are not.
April 3, 2007
At 1:49 pm TMC said:
I agree with noelegy — will you be selling prints of this and the snapdragon one? Love them both.
April 4, 2007
ulm
At 6:31 pm ulm said:
your botanic art is wonderful! you should create a separate section for it.
April 6, 2007
At 5:36 pm midevil said:
Gorgeous!
April 10, 2007
At 6:57 pm Olrox said:
I may be way off here, but to me its the baby suri escape pod timed to coincide with a massive scientological exodus–so long Tomkat!
April 22, 2007