What feels most obvious would be to start with the ancient magic that dwells in all life, bubbling up in primordial pools of soup long ago before humans ever walked the Earth. A magic still dwelling in the smell of burning juniper and the hollowed out gaze of small relatives.

But that’s much too far back, and will take me too long. So I leap across the webbing of time to my ancestors stretched wide throughout the Earth. Some of Turtle Island (Passamaquoddy). Some of Greece (Athens, Crete). Some of Egypt and Sicily, Ireland and France. Each wielding earth-rooted traditions springing from place-based ceremony and ritual. Peoples attuned to the lands that grow them, and the web of relations that birth them.

Again, I’d be here all year. So I leap once more to a place where all my ancestors collide. Genetic threads coalescing to form an enfleshed dream that is “me” entangling with countless other ancestral dreams. Juniper tree. Raccoon. Fox. Chris. Drie. Two different Matts. Turtle. Aspen. Oak. Coyote. Mary and Steve.

These photos are a testament to it all.

What began as a question to dear friend & fellow artist Chris Haas turned into a conjuring. Together we listened, in our own ways, for a creature desiring to emerge. 

Sacred and playful business this is, as masks are portals for spirits and forces to pass through, intent on wielding a wearer.

Overtime, my imagination was gripped by visions of accompanying adornment. A chest piece. A loin cloth.

In true chthonic fashion, this being reached out and found what he wanted. Unsolicited gifts and specialized support from the web of our relations.

A beaver tail gifted by friend and community member Matthew Eldredge. Help from Adrienne Young, a couture designer and performer, in stitching the coyote fur to the backs of his ears. A bloodstone cabochon from my mother. A turtle shell from my partner Matt’s aunt and uncle. All arriving at different times over a period of two years.

Birthed by an entire intra-specied community, this creature is now of the world, and I tremble with feral delight, wondering what holy mischief & sacred disruptions he’s setting loose on behalf of all life.

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Photos: Tempist Jade

Mask wielding Matt Huntze