T  H  E   P  H  A  N  T  O  M   S  E  L  F 

 

Just below the threshold of consciousness lies an opposite, a negative, a hidden self. The eminent psychologist Carl Gustav Jung believed that this negative self or shadow  was created during ego development in childhood, when we are at some point deemed worthless, inferior, unacceptable, or inadequate.

 

Subsequently, the pain from our wounded ego manifests as a mask or cover-up process to prove to others that we are not these terrifying things. When we don’t want to face these negative feelings about ourselves, we project them onto others by way of moral deficiency.

 

I see this projected emotional "pain-body" as a synthesis of personal pain that we unknowingly conceal from others based on our individualized repressions and a collective pain that resides within the energy field of a hive mind. I also view the pain-body as a psychic parasite and as a physical manifestation of the mental ego.

 

In this Multidimensional Fine Art series, Masks, images have been fashioned as abstract interpretations of the collective subconscious and, more specifically, what I call "The Phantom Self." This nebulous and dark side of our human nature must be confronted, accepted, and transcended before we can become self-reliant and emotionally balanced individuals and subsequently evolve into the Next Human.

 

This piece was inspired from a 15th century Aztec mask. I believe the Aztecs, along with other Mesoamerican cultures such as the Toltec, Mayan, and Incan, were direct descendants from the Atlanteans, and were given higher knowledge by the shaman king, Quetzalcoatl, a.k.a. "The Feathered Serpent."