As many Electron readers know, I've been a student of the Zoroastrian religion for a long time. This is the first monotheistic religion, preached by the prophet Zarathushtra about 3500 years ago. Zarathushtra conceived of the One God as a purely abstract being, but chose a burning domesticated flame as the central symbol of God. As a source of light, warmth, and energy, the controlled flame connects divinity with civilization. To this day, Zoroastrians pray before a burning fire, either in fire temples or at home in front of a simple candle.

In the process of learning Photoshop I've had the opportunity to do experimental projects which connect with my main concerns. One of my ambitions with Zoroastrianism is to give this ancient religion a visual dimension. Historically, the Zoroastrian religion has not had much of a visual identity, other than royal architecture and monuments from the old Persian empires. It certainly doesn't have the kind of instant visual recognition that Christian icons or Islamic geometric ornament and calligraphy have. Our modern global culture is a visual culture, which recognizes logos and pictures much quicker than texts. Therefore I have been working to give a recognizable identity to Zoroastrianism. My set of seven Persian Angels, done between 1996 and 2000, was my first attempt at this. Now that I am working in digital media as well as traditional, I've tried out an image in Photoshop.

The black outlines were drawn by hand and then scanned in. I colored the drawing in Photoshop, using different textures. I had in mind the look of "Tiffany glass" windows, though I didn't follow an exact imitation of stained glass.

The urn on which the fire burns is called an afarghan, and is used mainly by Indian Parsis rather than Iranians. The fire rests on a metal dish that goes on top of the urn. According to tradition, the fuel is sandalwood, and priests drop fragrant incense on the fire every so often. This fire is lit and maintained only during ceremonies, but in fire temples it is kept going perpetually, and the fire urn there is huge, sometimes as tall as a man. It is said that there are some Zoroastrian fires which have burned continuously for two thousand years, even through all the hardships that the faith has suffered. Two thousand years may be a legend, but there are documented Zoroastrian fires in India that have been burning since at least the eighteenth century. I hope digital files can last that long.

Posted at 3:46 am | link