Acrylic, Oil on Linen, 130x160cm, 2022

The White Mountain of Seir, on the Urmian Plateau, was the geographical matrix of the Gnostic movement. Near Eastern theocracies emerged in the Fertile Crescent, the directing agency behind them was the Magian Order that originated around Sier. From there the Zoroastrian Magi, later called the enlightened ones, spread southward and eastward, setting up the first theocratic states. From the same point a different branch of the Magian Order, comprising the telestai or Gnostics as we understand them today, spread both east and west, establishing the widespread network of the Mysteries. This painting can be understood as a secret gospel of action to venerate the living earth and her stored memories in the frozen snow pack of peaks. Through negotiating the dangerous ridge line the climbers are ascending through the aeonic realms toward union with the divine source of creation and thus becoming enlightened. This painting is about living ones own myth. The images within this painting were sourced from photographs of the Hillary Step on Mount Everest and several other himalayan peaks such as the Ogre. Such imagery fuses to form a new envisioned hyper-real place. These were sourced from photographs within the mountaineering literature of Chris Bonnington and Peter Habeler.