Oil on Canvas
2017

To Prey or To Pray?

䷋ ䷲ ䷗

That is the question.  Will our culture be known to posterity as a society of predators and prey, hunters and quarry, endlessly locked in a cycle of victim and perpetrator? Or will we as a people finally find the courage to face our base compulsions, transmute our unconscious actions and evolve to meet our higher nature, developing self-awareness through the faculties of compassion and empathy as we rise toward the creation of a reverent civilization?

“To Prey or To Pray?” asks the viewer to consider his (or her) relationship not only to the human female, but to the very principle of the Feminine: the Earth, the Mother archetype, the yin quality of receptivity.  Every nameless, faceless ‘Jane Doe’ whose body has been found, used and tossed aside like so much carrion, is part of a much greater story of an issue endemic to the human race – a lack of sensitivity, receptivity, empathy and most of all, a lack of respect for all life.  The issue of feminism also encompasses animals.  Until we can treat all living creatures as sacred and worthy of the same ethical considerations that we grant ourselves, until the exploitation and commodification of living beings comes to an end, until the strong protect and care for the weak, humankind may not know balance.  To bring balance between the sexes, we need to carefully examine our greater relationships to the principles of the Masculine and Feminine, both internally and externally.  Prayer can be an offering of gratitude or a means for self-reflection, but to pray also means to make a request or to ask, and in this way, it alludes to the pertinent issue of consent; asking for permission before taking.

In her Nature Goddess aspect, Venus is associated with animals of the forest and was once known as “The Lady of the Animals”.  Adonis, the horned god, who appears as both hunter and the sacrificial stag he hunts, fell in love with Venus when saw her bathing nude in a stream in the forest.  Our word “venison” actually means “son, or follower of Venus”.
(Excerpt from Alchemy: The Metals and Their Correspondences, D.W. Hawck)

To venerate is to regard with great respect, or to revere.

The image:
The upward-pointing triangle represents the masculine principle, while the ears of the doe imply the downward-pointing triangle, or feminine principle.  Contained within each sphere is an I Ching hexagram.

The reading:

䷋ 12. Standstill (Stagnation)
Gene Key – A Pure Heart

䷲  51. Arousing Thunder
Gene Key – Initiative To Initiation

䷗  24. Return
Gene Key – Silence–The Ultimate Addiction