A rough understanding of Jung was that he believed our mythological stories were archetypical in nature—that is, there was a universal, stick-figure like pattern to all psychological behavior that were imbedded in all of our folklore, myths, legends, traditions, etc. He dedicated his life to this idea, attempting to decode ancient stories and update them into contemporary psychological theory. At some point, he started dabbling in the seven stages of alchemical transmutation, which I decided to physically represent in my art. Alchemy was the predecessor to modern chemistry, and depending on the source material, the goal of the alchemist was either to turn lead to gold or to obtain the philosopher’s stone—an element that could transmute inert matter into living things, or grant immortality to its possessor. Jung believed that this was a largely metaphorical quest for the betterment of the human psyche, and he ended up mapping out what alchemist described as the steps to achieve that transformation.

The Empyrean Odyssey of Metal and Seas is an interactive map to guide us towards enlightenment, or rather the goals we set for our inner-self. What you’re looking at, these seven sculptures, is an abstract representation of a description of that path. In my line of work, the thing I consistently encounter is that people want to change, but they don’t know how to do it. Changing is difficult. Maybe you’re changing a habit. A pattern of behavior. Your identity. Your persona. Your career. Your circumstances. Your nature. In any event, changing what you were into what you want to become is a difficult endeavor. This is a path; it’s not an easy one, but it’s there. It’s always been there. It’s available to literally anyone, we just have a difficult time remembering it’s there because now it’s cloaked and lost in the fog of changing languages, fragmented history, and mysticism—which seems to eventually cloak most old, misunderstood things.