According to Greek mythology, Persephone was the daughter of Demeter (the goddess of grains) and was kidnapped by Hades (the god of the underworld) and taken into the underworld. Devastated by the loss of her daughter, Demeter took away the earth’s fertility threatening to starve mankind unless Hades relinquished her daughter. Zeus agreed to have Persephone retrieved on the condition that she hadn’t eaten anything while in the underworld or else she would be forced to stay there. Having eaten six seeds from a pomegranate, Persephone’s return could never be complete and so six months of the year she returns to Hades causing winter.

While the myth of Persephone is essentially an explanation of the changing seasons, I found it to be even more fundamentally about resurrection. And although traditional mythology casts Persephone as the wife of Hades, I feel like the relationship between Hades and Demeter and Persephone is similar to a divorced family- with the child being shunted back and forth between the two. In my mind Persephone unites life with death. She doesn’t fully belong to either world so she is able to bridge the divide between them.

Inspiration for this image came to me on New Year’s Day. The day (and as a result, the year) had gotten off to a bad start with a fight and a lot of bad feelings. I went for a walk just to get away from myself for a while. January in the Midwest is possibly one of the most depressing things I can think of, but I didn’t feel depressed. The sun was out and low in the sky so everything was starting to go gold around the edges. I felt warm. I felt like things were going to be ok, and the only think I could think of was how Persephone must feel rising up from the underworld.

Persephone has three hidden turtles.