Painting – Egyptian Beliefs beginning of afterlife

Painting – Egyptian Beliefs beginning of afterlife

Painting

A big part of my art is finding ways to express what I want to, but I also love looking into peoples cultures and finding out about their arts and beliefs as I find this really interesting. One that I have really loved is looking into is the Egyptian beliefs and the stories of their gods.

I have looked in to this a lot in the past and i find their belief of the after life interesting as a lot of people believe there is nothing. I am not sure what I believe, so I do like to get very involved in others thoughts as they do help me to be more open minded.

This means my art could take two different views, as I could do a persons life through time leading to nothing and then I could do a life leading to the after life.

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The Afterlife…..

For me to fully understand the after life I feel I need to look into the reason or beginning of the belief. For this I’m going to look deeper into the first tomb we found that shows us about what they did for the afterlife

Kha and Merit…..

Kha and merit were a husband (kha) and his wife (merit) who lives within a small village that was located between the desert and the river Nile in Egypt about 35,000 years ago. Their tomb was discovered and explored within 1906, They then moved everything within the tomb to a museum in Italy.

Within the tomb was all of their belongings from food to perfumes and more, this did also include their mummified bodies. This is the easiest form of preparing for the afterlife we have found (I think).

The belief of the afterlife was so strong that most of their life the people of this belief would make sure their hearts are not full of sin, as this would be detrimental for them in the journey through the under world.

What Happens within And Before The Afterlife…..

Egyptians loved life and they believed in life after death. For this they would have to lead good lives with no sin. They believed that the afterlife was like crossing the Nile and that living after death would be life their normal life, but only perfect. This is where they would become immortal.

To be prepared for the afterlife they would be mummified and put into a tomb. This tomb would be filled with all their belongings, for them to use within the afterlife. This could be from chairs to perfume to food and wine and a lot more.

Within the funeral all their belongings will be put into the tomb but there will also be a retiral called the “opening of the mouth” this is where a family member will use a tool to touch against the dead’s mouth. This tool is called a adze. (it was a special chisel)

Other parts of the retiral would include:

  • A band playing music – to open the persons hearing.
  • Dances – to open up the persons sight.
  • Perfume and scents – presented to the persons noise to open their smell.
  • The best food/wine – to open the persons soul.

This would then prepare them for the afterlife.

Their view on dead is a temporary thing before immortality. To be able to get to the afterlife and live within the perfect immortality, they would have to take a dangerous journey through the underworld. This would involved many different tasks that the god make but the most important one is the last test “the weighting of the heart”. This is where the god Osiris tests their heart for sin.

A heavy heart is a sign of sin and that their where bad within their life, a light heart means they lead a good life. If you are found to have a heavy heart this would lead for your heart to be through to a beast.

To help a person through this journey there was a book that was made called “book of the dead” this book was full of magical spells to help someone make it to the afterlife. this book was made on papyrus

References for information…..

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/magazine/2016/01-02/egypt-book-of-the-dead/

http://www.deirelmedina.com/lenka/TurinKha.html

http://www.profmcginty.co.uk/egyptadze.htm

Painting Project – My Ideas.

Painting Project – My Ideas.

Painting

From the mind map on my last post I have come up with a few idea that I could use. As by the end of this I have to create a series of paintings, I really want to do a painting on each subject within time. This could be words and ideas for example;

  • Physical Decay
  • Mental health Decay
  • Time
  • Change
  • Old and New

With this I could use each word to be a painting. So each painting could be looking into another aspect of time. This would make it easier to have a bigger over look of the subject time, without making one painting with way to much happening.

My First Idea…..

This idea is what I have just touched on. For this idea I would chose about 3-4 different words (possibly questions) to do a painting about. This would lead to having a series of paintings that are all different but they would all relate to the same subject, This would hopefully make an interesting visual galleries when they are all together.

To do this I would need to do a lot of research into different subject, but at the same time keep it light so that I don’t give myself to much work and then run out of time. One thing i have looked into before and want to bring into this project is Egyptian religion. Due to their belief within the afterlife. I want to use this because a lot of people believe we only have the time we physically do on this earth, but Egyptians believe that we have an afterlife. This would be a good subject to have on all of my paintings to have a visual link to all the paintings.

This is one of my favourite ideas and something I really want to look into more. I feel this idea will be the best to present the subject of time and be the more visually pleasing when put up.

Photo Links…..

https://www.canstockphoto.com/time-travel-clock-sphere-future-science-18237701.html

https://hubpages.com/education/Egyptian-Mythology-Afterlife

————————————-Another idea—————————————–

Another idea I have had is looking in to painting over time. This would involve looking into what is paint?, or what is a painting?. This idea I would have to so a lot of research for because it would involve looking so far back into time. One time that I really do want to look into for this idea is cave paintings.

I want to look into this because I think it is really interesting how we have developed painting over years even before we knew what it is (e.g cave paintings) I want to look into how paintings have changed materials wise and developed from cave painting to communicate to making religious art to show what we believe in.

I really like this idea as I feel there is a lot to look into and its looking in to what I’m doing not just painting. I feel this could be really interesting but its not my favourite idea, so I don’t know if this is one i would carry on with.

Photo Links…..

http://redhaattiya.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-animators-survival-kit-chapter-1.html

https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/Focus-on-medieval-art.671727