Zeitgeist - Visions of a contemporary mythology

Stories before History, myths emerge in four major domains of human’s search and behavior: the cosmologic, the mystical, the psychological and the sociological. These structures are so deep imbibed in our minds that we don’t perceive that we are immersed in them, unless we pay attention to their subtle manifestations. With this in mind, I started to ask my self: Which are the myths of this time, and which are the ones that had been relegated by considering them obsolete? Which ones had been substituted and why? Which myths are now constellating? Are there new myths or are they only new versions of recurrent myths? Who and how would be the characters, that is, the models of the current mythology? Who write the myths and for what? Are they created by poets, or politics, or philosophers, or for citizens, or countrymen, or those who have the society under their power? Who understand or interpret myths? What is hidden behind a myth? The purpose of this series is to represent allegorically aspects of what I conceive as a contemporary mythology, showing similarities with mythological characters who were originated in remote times, personifying behavior models that make the Zeitgeist, a German word which it’s approximated translation is “the spirit of the time”. Societies, cultures and civilizations try to validate stories that give meaning to their existence. Tradition shows who we were and who we are, and from two branches of knowledge, Mythos and Logos, the Human Being was able to explain perceptions of the universe and its avatars. But something happened when human’ ways of thinking and doing caused an imbalance among them: Logos displaced Mythos. This disequilibrium produced a kind of knowledge that helps to a good living, but little or nothing says about the meaning and purpose of our lives. This not questioning concerning Meaning (due to a pact with comfort) has caused a psychological dissatisfaction that makes it difficult to live, think and communicate poetically. If we had reached a no-return point I will try to return to the beginning of all stories, the world of myth to find in it the myths of my time. It maybe thought that this is a task for historians, anthropologists or philosophers. It’s not necessarily this way. Myth lives in our daily living as it always was, in the core of traditional societies. Now it seems that we want to ignore it: it’s easier to live in a world where Logic commands all our actions based in fields that Logic itself manages to validate. Perhaps Science is an example of it. May Science be thought as one of the myths of our time? Do we trust in it blindly guided by a system of beliefs? Time will tell. Think of Galileo, Copernicus and many others…Will History repeat again? I can’t help imaging the present Zeitgeist and how many faces it have. I envision multiple perspectives, some of them promising, some of them terrify. So, to clarify them and to orientate myself I go back to the origins to find the seeds of what someday will be. It is necessary to think and feel from there. At the beginning, it was the Myth.