Punk #31

Just as the book speaks to intelligence, the image in all its muteness speaks to the heart.

ROLLIN EYES

The aquatic world in a world to observe, to recreate, like the glacial landscapes. Both are a planet within ours, full of colors in the tropical case or minimalist in the glacier case, with strange species and wonderful animals each in its environment. This visual toy brings you a piece of that world in a fantastic setting.

Sophia Instantiation by Sophia the AI robot x Andreas Bonaceto

In this image, a giant sphinx spoons itself in erotic play within an aquatic styled environment littered by various denizens. These creatures include symbols and archetypes both current and nostalgic–each inhabiting a rootedness within mass cultural adolescence. Among the roster are Servbots, video game inspired mushrooms, a Pacman-like creature, a distant sea faring rubber duck, creatures sporting the symbols reminiscent of popular anime, and a Pokemon-like rabbit (a novel incarnation of Ganesha indicated by the Shiva trident on its nose). In addition, a few sea creatures partly inspired by sea monsters of western antiquity conglomerate along the mid left side of the composition. The Sphinx itself is an amalgam of aquatic, fetishist, ancient Egyptian, and 80’s style adornments, both living, as in a clown fish, or material, such as a cassette tape. Nautically colored antennae receive somatic signals from the atmosphere, perhaps from the 8 Ball moon or giant ringed planet beyond.

An anthropomorphic figure stands, wide eyed, staring at the viewer; its body masculine, muscular, and humanoid. Its “mind” dissociates into a conglomerate of structures resembling feathers, grain, teeth–as well as a radial flower “node”, casting linear rays throughout the composition. To his left, a vat of bodies gesture and writhe in a kind of amniotic soup, attended by a video game robot. The bot's red display reads “uWu”. Behind the robot and filling the left side of the composition is an archaic figure composed of a variety of vintage objects and symbols. Among them are a hardbound book with ancient cuneiform scripts, indicating barley, beer, bread, ox, house, and sky, behind which is a grimacing, salivating jagged toothed maw; and an old Commodore floppy drive. The figure’s head tilts toward an illuminated crescent moon, suggesting the Egyptian Sacred Bull. The archaic figure is composed of a variety of mutating cells, which shift in color, and pattern; eventually breaking free into an ephemeral broadcast of bubbles which move across the background. The work came into being against a psychological introspection, which included associations to pop culture such as alien abduction and pod people, as well as quite a bit of reflection on grains as a symbol of civilization, agriculture, sustenance, life, and imbibing (mainly whiskies).