Harvest Supper • 2023
Framed painting, 110x70cm, Ink on Canvas, wood, acrylic, varnish.
‘Harvest Supper’ (2023) is the latest iteration of ongoing research into the idea of the sacrificial king; the relation between this divine body and the fertility of the soil, in agrarian myths and rites. It depicts a vision of a feast generally partaken into, after a sacrifice, inspired by the narrative of Frazer’s ‘Golden Bough’.
In a floating space outside of time, this framed painting offers a glimpse into the suspended time of the ritual, in an ode to Mircea Eliade's analysis of the role of ritual and cyclically-occurring ceremonies, — in rural societies until the industrialisation and disenchantment of the lands.
The fragmented body parts echo a longtime interest in the fragmentation and duplication of royal and saintly bodies; a traffic of relics, most notorious during the Middle Ages.