Masked Quaternity (catalog #64)

This is the second painting I made concerning the mask theme in my career as an artist. It was painted after I’d graduated from high school, and was in college. I wanted to explore the mosaic style as expressed in oil paint some more at this period in my art, so you can see the pixelations on the masks as orderly strokes of oil.

I got the word “quaternity” from reading one of Carl Jung’s books on psychology. I think the specific volume is called Archetypes of the Unconscious from which I’d learned of this word. Jung was describing a psychological, symbolic, and archetypal concept using the word quaternity as an extrapolation from the concept of the trinity for which most people are familiar with.

In the trinity, there are things like unconscious, conscious, and superconscious; or, body, mind, and soul. In terrestrial terms, there is land, sea, and air. In religious terms, specifically Christianity, there is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. This painting, and this blog, however, is not intended to instill a specific religion’s message.

According to Jung’s quaternarian archetype, there is a fourth character that is introduced to a trinitarian model. Usually the fourth character is sort of a shady character. For example, to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost can be added Satan, hence completing the quaternity. Or, to the trinity of land, sea, and air can be added the fourth domain of space, which, indeed is quite dark considering the fact that most of the universe is now supposedly composed of dark matter, according to scientists, and astrophysicists.

So, to introduce the quaternarian model to the idea of the human masks, or the chemical/psychological masks we all wear in our relations with one another, I created this painting as a second step in that direction. None of the masks executed by the executant in this painting necessarily convey a dark, evil intent, but that’s not really the function of masks anyway. Masks are usually crafted so as to cover up, or obnubilate intent.

The mask theme develops in subsequent paintings, as I’ll show you in the future, but for now, I leave you with this painting to ponder in your daily meanderings as your moods change, your faces change, and your relationships diversify and/or simplify.