“The Taming of Eve” by Lash Xevious (detail)

It’s sometimes hard to look back and decide just exactly what event or events were, what I refer to, as Life- changers…those markers on the highway, for those of us who do believe in destiny, that change the direction we thought we were going. Second Life most surely can be named as one of those for me, and in the first weeks of Second Life, this sculpture, by Lash Xevious, “The Taming of Eve” is very much another.
Is anyone reading this, who is old enough to remember Lash Xevious, and her impressive and unique sim ?  La Reve, where Lash poured out her pain, darkness and bursts of  joy that were her truth. She told us stories through her sculptures; her wild creativity touched with a stroke of insanity called out like a siren, captivating and bewitching anyone who visited those shores.

Me: “Please sell me this sculpture” Lash Xevious: “No, it’s not for sale!”

So I spent hours on her sim, La Reve, dreaming in her floating beds, worshiping at the feet of this sculpture, that spoke to me in a very powerful way. I saw it back in 2008 as a monument to abuse by the powerful over the weak. It affected me so much, that I changed my RL plans to travel that Spring, and stayed where I was, which ultimately changed my life totally. I wrote this poem for it too:

Taming of Eve
for Lash Xevious
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
eyes of coral red
blood pulsing to your head
arch your neck and battle me
with fangs erect .

I will not melt in fear
although clutched you hold me near
there is no one to battle you
I stand alone.

inside you smile and grin
for you think that you will win
but I taunt  your open mouth to say
” just swallow me”
 
submission you demand
tamed  by your coiled hand
now I crawl in servile poses
while I plot your kill.

Karima Hoisan
March 16, 2008
Inspired by Lash Xevious’s
sculpture ” Taming of Eve”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Now today, five years later, I see this sculpture in a new light, as compelling as ever,
but the message is very different. The title is “The Taming of Eve,” not The Death of Eve, so in 5 years, Life both RL and SL has added to my own process of taming. The snake is a powerful and hypnotic symbol, an inherently  fearful one for most human beings, but in this sculpture, I see better what the snake might represent:

He has her pinned, helpless bound.
She struggles,wrapped in coils.
There is something she must learn.
He is willing to let her down
unscathed unharmed, and wiser;
if she only stops her struggling
if she only stops her kicking
if she only stops resisting
He will let her go,
if only she surrenders.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Replace the word “He” for Life, and that is what this sculpture reminds me, it can also be.
Sometimes Life knows better than we do. If we surrender, and don’t fight it, it sets us free from the trapped place, we feel we are in.

Anyway, Lash Xevious, by the way, never became my friend. It was her path to not do that, and she never acknowledged, most Ims and notecards, poems, a machinima poem,
“Water and Glass” and even a small book I wrote. She was aloof to most everyone, but one day, when the sim was about to be closed, she Im’d me and said,”I am selling the Sculpture if you are interested.” So now, on my sim LINC island, I have a small sculpture garden, with 4 amazing pieces by her. It is a tiny bit of La Reve preserved, and I invite anyone, who remembers, or who never had the chance, to come see her work displayed in a very tranquil (and romantic) setting. Come take a look. My sim is public, and an extension of my creativity. It is where Nat and I make our movies above, and where music, beauty, Art and romance prevail (besides a little humor sprinkled here and there)
Come walk in the garden, remember or discover for the first time, the talent of Lash Xevious, a pioneer in full-sim installations. I leave you with a few more images and a poem I wrote for her way back then. Here is your taxi to visit: LINC Island Sculpture Garden

Avatars

Bold Caution

Severed Connection

La Reve In Me
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
for Lash Xevious and her La Reve

Pulled into your darker place
cozy in commiseration, we share a pillow
rock hard.. so discomforting  for most.
Blues sing blues, fossilized building blocks
of everything in your world.
I saw you scissor- handed that day,
white cuffs cutting and creating
slashing it all away.

On your island
you live the metaphor,
high walled cliffs protect and serve
yet something always gets through
wanted or unwanted;
Life’s not a menu from which we choose.
Your dream in azure,
translucent shards,
cobalt glass…
Those little shacks held secrets
before you blew them away
and we used to feel your swoon
and did it too
right next to you.

Haunted we return
and bring witnesses,
roam those rocks.
There is absence of pain.
 The ruins allow gentle waves
to lap their columns,
a proud reminder of when it all fell down
it still turned into something….
maybe bruised
but not impossibly broken.

At the end of the sunlight
I float in your bed
catching your dreams.  
Chess pieces
soulless  swine soldiers
tumble from the peak,
the aftershock can be felt
and everything that should now be stopped
keeps moving, in endless little tremors,
everything at once still in motion
somehow still as death.
It got as bad as it could get
and yet  human love survived here,
rebuilding….
honoring
the dream.
It became a comfortable nightmare
that you’ve learned to wear well
with style and elegance.

Rise in defeat Artist!
Take pen and brush
blow torch in hand,
with a vengeance
recreate it new.
Your titles,
subliminal war cries
your island,
the most intimate  you.

Karima Hoisan
March, 16, 2008
La Reve SL