Photo-Paintings by Nik Kaba

              A nod to Ancient Egypt,  Bernini and Dali
         
A little bit of History:
In the Ancient Egypt the obelisk symbolized the sun god Ra, and was said to be a petrified ray of the sun-disk. It was also thought that the god existed within the structure.
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The "world-elephants" are mythical animals bearing the world on their backs which, according to some authors, appear in Hindu Cosmology.
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In 1665 a small Egyptian obelisk was found in the monastery garden of Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. Pope Alexander VII asked Gian Lorenzo Bernini to set it up in the square in front of the church. Inspired by Francesco Cilia’s 15th century novel “Poliphilo’s Dream of The Love Battle”, where the hero encounters a stone elephant that carries an obelisk on its back, Bernini created a pedestal for the Egyptian Obelisk in the image of an elephant.
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Bernini’s sculpture in Rome inspired Dali’s painting, “Les Elephants” .It features elephants that have long but thin legs and huge bodies with Egyptian Obelisks on their backs. In most of his painting, Dali used his own hometown as background. Maybe a reminder that, no matter what, we should never forget where we come from.

From the artist:
In 2010 I was offered to move to Washington DC for work. It was a sudden and unexpected proposal and I had to make my decision on the spot. I felt that my present became my past in a matter of moments. This abrupt end of one chapter of my life and the beginning of another one triggered some thoughts and reflection on my life’s journey.
While living in DC I started working on the “Egyptian Obelisk”.
In this photo-painting the first elephant is caring away on its back a city in Russia where I was born - Saratov. The second elephant - Saint Petersburg, followed by San Francisco and Washington DC. The Egyptian Obelisk is rising in the center of the horizon symbolizing an eternal axis around which everything revolves.
                                                                                                                          

Nik Kaba