FLATFILEphotography MYTHIC exhibition

PERSEPHONE STATEMENT

For FLATFILEphotography’s MYTHIC exhibit, Carrie Notari created these images as an evocative visualization of the Persephone narrative, a rich and resonant Greek myth about destruction and renewal. In this sequel to her 1989 Persephone series, she montages images to create an otherworldly vision that evokes the narrative cycle of death and regeneration. In this installation of mural scale prints, she explores the myth further as Persephone embraces her role as Queen of the Underworld and emerges to bring spring and renewal to the earth.

In May 1989, Carrie Notari exhibited the PERSEPHONE installation at the RHODE ISLAND SCHOOL OF DESIGN'S Red Eye Gallery in Providence for her Master of Fine Arts thesis. In this initial series, she focused on Persephone’s abduction into the Underworld/Unconscious realm. For this work she received a 1991 Illinois Arts Council Grant and a 1992 Fulbright award.

The digital photographs are printed with Ultrachrome Inks on Epson Luster paper and are archival for 100+ years. All prints are signed, dated, numbered in a limited edition of 6 and available in 5 different image sizes ranging from 14” x 21” up to 44” x 66”.

See Carrie Notari's artwork

“The Mysteries Remain”

The mysteries remain,
I keep the same
cycle of seed-time
and of sun and rain;
Demeter in the grass,
I multiply,
renew and bless
Bacchus in the vine;
I hold the law,
I keep the mysteries true,
the first of these
to name the living, dead;
I am the wine and bread. I keep the law,
I hold the mysteries true,
I am the vine,
the branches, you,
and you.
- H. D.

Orphic Hymn to Proserpine

Daughter of Jove, almighty and divine,
Come, blessed queen, and to these rites incline:
Only-begotten, Pluto's honored wife,
O venerable Goddess, source of life:
'Tis thine in earth's profundities to dwell,
Fast by the wide and dismal gates of hell:
Jove's holy offspring, of a beauteous mien,
Fatal, with lovely locks, infernal queen:
Source of the furies, whose blest frame proceeds
From Jove's ineffable and secret seeds:
Mother of Bacchus, sonorous, divine,
And many-formed, the parent of the vine:
The dancing Hours attend thee, essence bright,
All-ruling virgin, bearing heavenly light:
Illustrious, horned, of a bounteous mind,
Alone desired by those of mortal kind.
O, Vernal queen, whom grassy plains delight,
Sweet to the smell, and pleasing to the sight:
Whose holy form in budding fruits we view,
Earth's vigorous offspring of a various hue:
Espoused in Autumn: life and death alone
To wretched mortals from thy power is known:
For thine the task according to thy will,
Life to produce, and all that lives to kill.
Hear, blessed Goddess, send a rich increase
Of various fruits from earth, with lovely Peace;
Send Health with gentle hand, and crown my life
With blest abundance, free from noisy strife;
Last in extreme old age the prey of Death,
Dismiss we willing to the realms beneath,
To thy fair palace, and the blissful plains
Where happy spirits dwell, and Pluto reigns.

In doubtful dreams of dreams;
I watch the green field growing
For reaping folk and sowing,
For harvest-time and mowing,
A sleepy world of streams.
…
I am weary of days and hours,
Blown buds of barren flowers,
Desires and dreams and powers
And everything but sleep.
…
No growth of moor or coppice,
No heather-flower or vine,
But bloomless buds of poppies,
Green grapes of Proserpine,
Pale beds of blowing rushes,
Where no leaf blooms or blushes
Save this whereout she crushes
For dead men deadly wine.
…
Pale, beyond porch and portal,
Crowned with calm leaves, she stands
Who gathers all things mortal
With cold immortal hands;
Her languid lips are sweeter
Than love's who fears to greet her
To men that mix and meet her
From many times and lands.

from “The Garden of Prosperine”
by Algernon Charles Swinburne