Ever since I was a young kid, I’ve been amazed by past cultures and civilizations. The ancient Egyptians were definitely one of my favorites. I remember going to the library and grabbing all the books they had on the subject, and just getting completely lost in the pages of pyramids, mummies, obelisks, and hieroglyphs. I was captivated by the theriocephaly gods like Ra, Anubis, and Thoth. They were a lot more interesting than the old man in the sky story I was taught in religious school. I’d get so excited imagining what life would have been like back then, what the cities of Memphis and Thebes looked like during the time of Ramesses and Tutankhamun. As I got older, I began to dig deeper into the subject of our ancient past, not just in Egypt, but all over the globe especially those of early Mesopotamia.

We have been gifted with the ruins of gigantic megalithic structures and sculptures as well as other magnificent artifacts in Egypt, Mexico, Turkey, Peru, India, and Iraq… the list goes on and on. These ruins are scattered, broken and buried by the hands of time, man and Mother. We are left baffled by the size, precision, beauty and complexity of these seemingly impossible ancient stone marvels, some of which have been dated much later than what conventional archaeologists have claimed. The Sphinx enclosure at the pyramid complex in Cairo is a good example which shows evidence of thousands of years of flooding and rain erosion, none of which was present during the time it is currently being dated by mainstream Egyptologist. There are still major holes in our past, like how we quarried huge blocks with just simple copper chisels and transport them sometimes miles in some instances even up mountains. It feels like there was a great wealth of knowledge we have forgotten through time. Since the discoveries of these ruins left behind we have been trying to piece together the fragments of the great mysteries of our ancestors lives. Countless connections keep emerging. Many images, symbols, and stories from these ancient cultures are repeated over and over such as The Great Flood, pine cones, a headless human figure with its arms raised, and this intriguing bag that shows up in Mesopotamia, Guatemala, India, and even in Turkey at the amazing megalithic site of Gobekli Tepe which has been dated between 10,000 to 11,500 years ago. This massive site contains huge stone circles surrounding massive T shaped Pillars some weighing up to 20 tons beautifully decorated with reliefs of abstract anthropomorphic details like clasping hands (reminiscent of Moai on Easter Island) clothing, animals as well as this mysterious bag. Many consider it the First Temple. All of these cultures separated by long stretches of time and great distances all containing the same symbols and stories among so many other connections leads one to consider a lost epoch of human history a global civilization that existed before the Great Flood.

As an adult I am still getting lost in the pages of the past imagining what life was like in that world before the flood, and how humans rebuilt civilization after. The images of strange Gods, ancient symbols, structures, and the beautiful stories make their way into my dreams. I can’t help but to allow them to make their way into my work. The paintings for this exhibition at Anno Domini are reflections of my dreams and thoughts pertaining to our deeply strange, magical and mysterious ancient past.

Apkallu (The Seven Sages) is Zero Cents’ third solo show at Anno Domini.

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