Empedocles’ archetype
Empedocles was a Greek philosopher who lived in the 5th century BC in Sicily. He taught that all the entities consist of four elements — fire, air, earth and water — that are mixed and separated from each other under the influence of love and strife. Empedocles insisted that he was incarnation of God and his followers could resurrect the dead. Legend has it that he threw himself into the crater of Etna volcano. In this study Minakov Andrey investigates philosophical archetype and offer his view on the given historical period. Kornuschenko called this archetype as ‘Empedocles archetype’. Basing on the similarities in the lives and art, this term unites lots of different artists. Agreeing with him, author analyzes the demonstration of Empedocles’ archetype using Friedrich Nietzsche as an example. Radical heroism — Nietzsche’s "Amor fati" — is the fatal sense of Empedocles’ archetype: throw oneself into the abyss and hope for the rise. Author’s works are the visual interpretation of Empedocles’ archetype in life and work of Friedrich Nietzsche. This is author’s version of spiritual path of the protagonist, which is based on personal perception and interpretation of his paradigm.
Minakov analyzes the origins of Nietzsche’s philosophy and selects appropriate visual form for it, for his attitude and internal state of given periods of his life. At this point of work Andrey chooses three main Friedrich Nietzsche states:
- Transition from philology to philosophy
- Death of Gods as internal commotion
- Spiritual anguish – illness Plastically author divides his work in three parts thereby showing variety of the states. The protagonists in the Andrey’s work are animated mental states of Friedrich Nietzsche. Author analyzes historical events in the life of German philosopher and animates them in the form of art.
“for he has no human head fitted to a body, nor do two shoots branch out from the trunk, nor has he feet, nor swift legs, nor hairy parts, but he is sacred and ineffable mind alone, darting through the whole world with swift thoughts”.
Empedocles — ‘Purifications’
