This work is a combination of photographic images inspired by the I-Ching or book of changes. It is part of a series of art pieces created by arranging images representing the attributes of each trigram, one above and one below, to illustrate the sixty-four hexagrams from the book.
The I-Ching is one of the first efforts of the human mind to place itself within the universe. It has exerted a living influence in China for over three thousand years. First set down in the dawn of history as a book of oracles, the Book of Changes deepened in meaning when ehtical values were attached to the oracular pronouncements. It became a book of wisdom, eventually one of the five classics of Confucianism, and provided the common source for Confucianist and Taoist philosophy.
The combinations of broken and solid lines that make up each hexagram are generated by the yarrow stalk oracle, invented in ancient times by the holy sages. To heaven they assigned the number three and to earth the number two, from these they computed the other numbers. They contemplated the changes in the dark and light and established the hexagrams in accordance with them. They brought about movements in the firm and yielding and thus produced the individual lines. Through this process they arrived at an understanding of fate.
Each piece combines digital photography with hand painted hexagrams and hand drawn calligraphy.