'Teotihuacan'

This painting was inspired by the ancient city in Mexico which was a multi-ethnic civilization.  Teotihuacan was one of the most populous cities on the earth, at that time.  It is believed that construction of this city began around 100 B.C. and the civilization was populated until sometime between the 7th or 8th century A.D.  The reason this painting represents a bloody hand print is that Teotihuacan was a bloody, violent civilization.  It is believed that the inhabitants of this deeply religious city thought that Teotihuacan was "the place where man met the gods".  It was also thought of as the place where gods were born, and it was also believed that human blood was an honorable gift to "present" to the gods, so, much blood was spilled in the name of gods by way of sacrificial rituals which usually ended with the heart of the one being sacrificed to be cut out of the body while it was still beating, or the head being cut off so that much blood would flow in order for the gods to appreciate the sacrifice that was being made in their honor.

I do not find these ancient barbaric civilizations worthy of much praise, due to their religious beliefs, but I find the advanced construction of their structures incredibly fascinating.  Teotihuacan is the site of the largest pyramid in the world.  It is not the tallest pyramid, but it has a larger footprint than any other and has a greater volume of interior space than any other pyramid known to man.

Another reason that I painted this to look like a bloody hand print is the parallels of our civilizations of then and now.  This painting is my most recently completed piece of artwork, having been completed before this latest mass killings at a school.  But we find ourselves living in a world where mankind is doing a lot of killing, much of it is in the name of religion, which is usually the case in the Middle East.  But some of the killing appears to be done on a selfish personal level by mentally unstable loner-types, like the gunman in the Connecticut school mass murders.

Teotihuacan, of old, and America, of now, are really not that different, as far as the amount of bloodshed is concerned.  The violence of our two societies are one and the same, but the bloodletting occurred for different reasons.  In Teotihuacan, the killing happened in a very barbaric, animalistic, heinous manner to honor gods.  In America of today, the killing happens by way of advanced technology that allows more deaths to happen in a much shorter time frame, but the sense-less killings are just as heinous.  Teotihuancan and America, societies with savages among the civilized.

 'Whistleblower On The Mount'

 There once was a territory in the Middle East

For years, on hatred, its people did feast

With soil contaminated by blood

Once was covered by great flood

The contempt between its' people is quite a beast

 The Jews are anticipating building a temple on the mount in Jerusalem at some point in the future.  What kind of people would build a temple to honor their god on land contaminated by so much bloodshed?  Their god must not be deserving of better.

 There once was a temple-less people

Who wished the mount would hold their steeple

But much blood had flowed

 The wish was not bestowed

For the steeple of the temple-less people

 You would think the people would choose land that is rich in nutrients that give life, not land that is stained with a history of the bloodshed of war and hatred.

 With so much death, our earth is broken

It's more the land, not the people that's token

Blood ruins the soil

For this we all toil

We need peace on earth, of this I've spoken

   The roots of the peacelessness between the Jews and Muslims can be traced to religious intolerance for each other's religion, and claims of land ownership by way of gods, on behalf of religious beliefs.  These monotheistic peoples are living a life of fiction.  Blind fiction.  Monotheistic religions are the root of all evil, and ALL evil on this earth is man-made.