At the Point of Creation

©JAL, 8-11-2007

This image has undergone quite a process to get it where it is now. It has an unusual source of inspiration. I had been grooving over Llee Heflin's fractilated Thoth tarot cards. He shows the original, not created by him, and then his variations on them. They are spell binding in their complexity. Meanwhile, I saw one of the original cards, the 'Art' card, and I decided to have at it for artistic inspiration, as well:


Smaller version of the original Aleister Crowley/Lady Frieda Harris version.

I did this partly by observation and partly by intuitive method. Thusly, it came out considerbly different, the eagle and the lion turning into a sort of masculine Set creature and a feminine winged snake.

I took that sketch and neatened it up a bit via digital methods. Then I made a print of it with the computer printer. I took watercolor pencils to it. It still wasn't what I wanted, so after the scan I did quite a lot of digital fixing on it. After all that, I have a picture I like.


"Triamazikamno"

There's quite a bit of symbology going on, much of it inherent in the original image. There's three characters present in both, representing Gurdjieff's "Triamazikamno", or his "law of three". The Law of Three controls the workings of the universe, based on three forces: Active, Passive and Reconciling.

Perhaps the Set like figure is the active element, the feminine winged snake is the receptive element, and the lady stirring the pot is the reconciling element?

Or you could just look at it as a 'pretty picture', and wonder what the cook is making, and are they all gonna eat it?