Creation of the Halcyon Dome
There are times when making art is a struggle. When it’s a job and you get up in the morning and hammer your head against a concept day after day until you finally figure out how to take an idea and make it physical.
Then there are other days when it feels like the thoughts in your head are flowing through you, from some greater channel out there in the universe. It was like that with the Halcyon Dome.
On the way home from New York I felt so inspired. Figment had gone amazing and I was just itching to create. I knew that the next dome series would be going to Solstice Festival, and hadn’t even begun to think up a concept yet.
Now let me preface this by saying that Solstice is my favourite festival in the entire world. Having come to hundreds at this point, that’s saying something. There’s something about the land, the people, the music and the feeling that I just don’t get anywhere else. It’s the only festival I will willingly pay for every year, rather than getting paid for it.
I’ll write more about the festival later, but I knew that I wanted to bring something special this year. I was interested in creating a meditation dome. Any festival needs a point of calm, and the domes really facilitate that type of temple-like space.
As my practice often does, I started by researching words that I feel embody an idea. My immediate thesaurus search for “calm” came across a word I rarely used- halcyon. Struck by the beauty of the word, I began researching where it came from, and down the rabbit hole I fell, struck across the head by an otherworldly perfect coincidence for the concept that I was looking for.
The origin of the word is based in a greek myth, full of love, loss and healing.
Queen Alcyone and King Ceyx were very happy together in Trachis. Then one day Ceyx went off to sea to visit an oracle. Alcyone begged him not to go, as she was the daughter of the wind god Aeolus, and she knew the ocean and winds could be treacherous. But Ceyx went anyway, and as Alcyone feared, a terrible storm came upon him and he perished.
When her husband’s body appeared before her floating towards shore, Alycyone was so overcome
with grief that she threw herself into the ocean. But before she could hit water, she was transformed into a bird.
As she flew skimming along the water surface toward the body of her husband, her throat poured forth sounds full of grief. Feeling her deep grief, the gods out of pity changed the couple into a pair of halcyon birds.
Ovid and Hyginus both also make the metamorphosis the origin of the etymology for "halcyon days", the seven days over solstice when storms never occur. They state that these were originally the 14 days each year during which Alcyone (as a kingfisher) laid her eggs and made her nest on the beach and during which her father Aeolus, god of the winds, restrained the winds and calmed the waves so she could do so in safety. The phrase has since come to refer to any peaceful time. Its proper meaning, however, is that of a lucky break, or a bright interval set in the midst of adversity; just as the days of calm and mild weather are set in the height of winter for the sake of the kingfishers' egglaying.
There was a saying of fishermen during this time of year in Greece that said, “The halcyon days are here. Let us be glad. There is nothing to fear.”
Needless to say, this story blew my mind at the very time when I was looking for a theme for a meditation dome. The idea of transforming through death into nature to be with the one you love. The idea of the gods calming the storms so that you could rest in the midst of times of struggle. The idea that, even when you see no way out and think that your world is ending, something unexpected might happen that will immediately bring you peace and joy.
Within an hour the entire concept for the dome had coalesced. As soon as I began researching bird people the imagery really came together. X-rays of birds bearing such a similar resemblance to the female form, I couldn’t help but draw my own and make it into the guardian of this space.
When I got home from New York I immediately started crafting the skin and the centre piece of the dome. Last year I had been touring with the
of the
, but the south panel had never been finished.
As well I made white panels to surround the bottom of the dome to give it a feeling of floating in space.
For the centrepiece I wanted to work with Amethyst, a traditional stone of calming and peace.
I set them all in solder and hung them in chains that would hang from the ceiling of the dome, with guardian bird women dispersed without.
I added hanging fabric to give the whole piece a swaying, mobile-like feeling.
A day later, in the middle of obsessively building, but desperately needing to take a break for food, I ran into a little shop right by my house to grab something. Sitting there on the shelf was a statue of Horus, Egyptian god of resurrection, another bird deity of safety and protection. There was no reason for him to be in the shop full of chips and $0.50 pens, other than that he obviously needed to be a part of this piece. So home he came with me, adding the perfect serendipitous anchor to the centre of the space.
As well I printed a bunch of stickers of the guardian, for people to take home with them from the dome.
The entire piece came together in a matter of days, from concept to fruition. It truly felt inspired by something outside of myself.
Coming soon, images of the dome at Om!
And what I'm listening to today-