Staircase to the Lost Kingdom

This sculpted plasticine piece on wood board, tries to offer a multidimensional meditation on humanity’s spiritual division and the persistent yearning to ascend. The central motif, a spiraling staircase inspired by Frank Gehry’s architectural gem at the AGO, rises boldly into a cosmos of stars and voids, echoing the ancient human desire to transcend the physical realm. Yet it ends in darkness, suggesting a broken link between earth and the divine.

The ground is a checkerboard floor, a symbolic reference to the dualities of life: light and dark, flesh and spirit, knowledge and ignorance. 12 pieces are missing from the pattern, a deliberate absence representing the lost apostles, the fragmentation of spiritual unity, and the voids left by forgotten guides.

Before the spiral, 5 modest steps recall the 5 wounds of Christ, signposts of suffering that must be confronted before one begins the journey inward and upward. The naked male and female, at once Adam and Eve, and the Jungian anima and animus, stand at the threshold, embodying innocence, vulnerability, and the human clash with the unknown.

The three arches: Byzantine, Romanesque, and Ottoman, symbolize diverse spiritual paths, none holding exclusive truth. Beyond them lie a waterfall (lost innocence), a tree of life (forgotten wisdom), and a distant castle (the soul’s lost home). These vistas echo like memories or dreams within a museum space, suggesting that what was once spiritual reality is now a relic under glass.

Above each landscape floats a celestial symbol: a galaxy, a star, and a black hole, invoking the cosmic forces beyond human understanding and the unknown realms of the afterlife or higher consciousness.

Divided into seven levels, mirrors the chakras, suggesting that the divine ascent is not outward, but inward. The staircase’s break from its heavenly end reflects modern humanity’s spiritual rupture.

Ultimately, this work reflects on lost wisdom, innocence, and the timeless quest for transcendence, asking if we still dare to ascend within, to restore the bridge between the divine and the dust from which we came.