Early June, Golems and other Stuff

June 2011 has begun with exhibition opportunities, gallery openings, and various restoration/casting projects . Here is a sample of the sundry possibilities that are brewing or have come to fruition since the beginning of this month, along with a little commentary on the meaning of some of these images. Late May I watched the silent film "The Golem: How He Came into the World" which was filmed in 1920 and is a beautiful example of German Expressionist film. The film tells the story of a magical being made of clay come to life. The Golem is based on and Jewish legend of a creature brought to life by a Rabbi using demonology. I was most impressed with the scene where the Rabbi summons the demon Astaroth. Astaroth, I learned from research, is a prince demon of Hell who answers all questions put to him, destroys through promoting laziness and philosophy and belongs to an order Gamchicoth/Devourers who seek to waste the substance and thought of creation.

Astaroth from the film "The Golem: How He Came into the World"

The other really interesting thing about the story is that The Golem is animated by a word( given by Astaroth ) which is written on paper and placed into an amulet. This amulet is placed on the clay figure and it comes to life. Also, if the amulet is removed the Golem looses its animation. i also found in my research on the Golem legend that this word was typically emet(truth in Hebrew) and that removing the e would deactivate the Golem (leaving it with met- "dead" in Hebrew langauge). Very much like the villain I remember from childhood on the television show "The Electric Company" named Spell Binder who was Letterman's arch nemesis and would change words around to change situations. Letterman would always replace the proper letter to save the day.