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Jeffrey Briggs, Pegasus

¨Pegasus¨
Dominance

31.5¨ x 22.5¨ x 2¨

With our large brains and useful hands humans have been able to dominate nearly all other animals. We exert control over even the greatest of them, by seizing, restraining and forcibly confining them.

This work expresses that moment when humans drive the spirit of free will from other fellow animals. Maybe our motive is to tame, domesticate, breed, to feed our ever mushrooming populations or maybe our reason for controlling is simply to satisfy our need for a pet.

Pegasus's soaring flight in Greek antiquity was interpreted as an allegory of the soul's immortality. If one interprets the soul as the intangible spiritual nature of humankind, why should it not follow that other animals have souls too. Maybe the proof of this is that for many animals we wish to dominate we must capture, restrain and confine each and every one. We drive the spirit away to have it return anew with each animal.