Nov

History Through A Purple Haze

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Ivory Skies, ancient history, esoteric tees, historical t-shirts, ivoryskies.net, mythology

Ivory Skies are back with their latest collection of tees entitled ‘Purple Haze’. Take a trip through time and explore yet more ancient myths, lost talismans, and spiritual iconography from across the ages. Over the next few weeks IvorySkies.net will be revealing the stories behind the designs in all their glory. The new series of t-shirts include a Sacred Beetle, an absolutely beautiful Zodiac, Angel Horns, Good Vs. Evil, a Snake Dragon and the Wisdom of ancient Eastern spirituality.

No matter if you’re a history buff, a spiritual sort, a lover of the obscure, or none of the above I’m sure you’ll find their latest tees very tantalising. I have to admit I am all of the above and so I supposed I am biased. As an artist much of the process of conjuring new and original images to inspire debate and reflection come from a knowledge of art history, ancient cultures, and a fascination with anthropological research and esoteric texts. It’s useful learning about Man’s past, on the most basic level it provides a greater relative context for our present society. It seems rather ironic to me that here we are at possibly the end of yet another empire, whilst most of the population show little interest or indeed understanding of the rise and fall of those civilisations that have proceeded us. The human race lives by cycles of progression and regression, expansion and contraction, belief systems, fashions, governments, celebrities and icons all finally disappear into the past as new ones arise.

Much of this same thinking emanates from Ivory Skies’ collection, opening up a whole new and simultaneously ancient area of art and design, for a generation of t-shirt fans who know or or are intrigued to find out exactly where we stand in the history of mankind. Take a look at these top picks from the new Purple Haze series for a 101 in ancient mythological history:-

Zodiac Tee

As mentioned earlier, the Zodiac tee is by far my favourite item in the new Purple Haze collection. In fact I could easily imagine the late great Jimi Hendrix sporting just a design, its truly a beautiful print. Complex yet subtle, the intricacy of the horoscopic wheel draws the eye in ever closer, and as it happens it reminds me of a recent email conversation with a friend at Beautiful / Decay. We were discussing the merits of astrology, she being a fervent follower, whilst I something of a sceptic. Even if it was an accurate system for prophecy or at the very least philosophical device for understanding human nature, the fact is that the planets, the positions of stars, indeed the location of our whole galaxy have moved since its inception means even with the most accurate data regarding date and time of birth, for most it paints a rather broad brush for the study of archetypes. Carl Jung delved into archetypal facets of the human identity in great depth. It’s true that most idioms of the individual, personality traits, emotional make up and so forth can be categorised into twelve psychological ‘characters’, more modern psychoanalysis and even to an extent market research has revealed a vast swathe of sub-archetypes, individuality is a cherished commodity these days, far more so than when the world could achieve little more than subsistence and survival. Get this particularly esoteric tee for £22 in sizes S to XL here.

Sacred Beetle Tee

Another excellent design, I admit that beetles are not my most favourite of creatures on the earth, although they do all have their place in the great scheme of things, half swallowing a giant Stag Beetle in the middle of the night on an ill fated camping holiday might’ve jaded my opinion – even if they are some of the oldest living species on the earth. Yet even I can admire Ivory Skies’ particularly entemological study, in this case focusing of the ancient Egyptian love affair with the Scarab Beetle. The Sacred Beetle is associated with the Egyptian god, Khepri. It was believed that is was Khepri, a solar deity, who’s primary task was to ‘push the sun across the sky’. The sacred scarab beetle is a representative symbol for rebirth, both of Man and the universe around him. Each day the sun disappeared, always to rise again to be reborn the following day. Buy the Sacred Beetle tee for £22 in sizes S to XL.

See the rest of the Purple Haze collection of tees at IvorySkies.net today.