Mysterion of the Cosmos

Florence International Bienalli of Contemporary art. Florence, Italy. Arcetri Astro Physics Laboratory. Florence, Italy.

Parco della Pace di Ravenna, Italy

World Trade Center International Monument and Museum. New York City.

Pyramid of Souls

Andrei Sahkarov Human Rights Monument. Moscow.

In 1941 Jerry Carter entered the world in the heartland of America: Wichita, Kansas. Born perched on the expansive Great Plains of the North American continent, Jerry, as a child, often found himself standing in the vast open fields beneath the night sky, bathed in the crystal-clear radiance of the Milky Way. There, he embarked on a personal voyage of exploration, attempting to estimate the distances to various stars and planets. The scorching Kansas Summer Sun bore down upon him, its intensity as a constant reminder that The Sun was fearsome. It was a large hot blinding glow inhabiting the vastness of space.

By the age of seven, as his family departed the boundless horizons of Kansas for their new home in Washington, D.C. Jerry had internalized certain truths: that he resided within the vastness of space, that the sun was both a source of life and a potentially perilous force, and that beneath the cultivated wheat fields lay large scollop shells of an ancient seabed from the Jurassic era.

juxtaposed to the urban sprawl of Washington, D.C. and tall trees loomed over him, casting shadows that masked the night sky's brilliance. Through the occasional gaps in the urban canopy, he caught only fleeting glimpses of distant stars he was familiar with, obscured by the ever-present glow of city lights and smog.

Carter's overarching aspiration is to shed light, instill serenity, and inspire action as we pay homage to and preserve the divine order and structure within which we exist. Carter says it is time for us to broaden our conscious recognition of our place within the Universe, and revere our nurturing living host, covering the thin rocky crust all life is dependent on. For we, our actions, have undeniably reduced the Earth's capacity to sustain us.

Without returning to a sustainable way of life for the living system, which Jim Lovelock identifies as GAIA, we and our offspring are destined to become faint echoes, leaving behind nothing but molecular fragments of dust in a vast Universe. The insights we have cultivated throughout history endure; our essence transcends the finality of "the end." It is our duty to pass down this wisdom to our progeny so they, too, can understand that they possess the power to transcend the confines of Human self centeredness of material interpretations. Humans must strive for a higher plane of existence by accepting the fact that our existence is secondary to the existence of the whole living system covering the rocky crust of this planet we inhabit.