Alabaster Goddess

There are many references in this image. This is actually one of the more loaded pictures I’ve done in my life. I made a video that covers all the references, you can watch it here (60 second short video)

1) The white lotus
My Alabaster Goddess of Mercy is an incredibly soft and floral tea. I think tie guan yin is aromatically a white colored-floral tea, perhaps like lily’s, white orchids, or even tiny carpet flowers such as meadow sweet. One of my good friends has a white lilac tree in her backyard, as I walked past it in the summer she made sure I took a moment to smell it. I’d say its very much in that same scent zone. Guanyin (the goddess of mercy and compassion in Buddhism) stands above a lotus. I wanted to incorporate that.

2) Nico Robin from One Piece and the thousand armed Guanyin
There’s so little one can do with 2 arms. This tea is so relaxing its like you’re getting a simultaneous full body massage, even hands rubbing your temples and scalp. There was a particular one piece adult manga I read years ago where Nami and Robin were having a multi armed interaction. I remembered thinking “wow, so creative” at the time. It stuck in my mind as something I wanted to do one day. In Buddhism there are many forms of Guanyin, one of them has 1000 arms. I wanted this to be a guanyin image, but also not the standard one, so I chose to use the 1000 arm Guanyin to symbolize that though this is ‘just another tieguanyin’ in your life, it’s an abnormal one.

3) The pose
Sitting upright with the right arm resting on the a bent right knee, is a classic Guanyin pose.

4) Some particular motif’s:
When I was in Japan in May 2024, I went to the Toji temple antique fair. I purchased a scroll of guanyin which hangs in the stairwell of my house. Several motifs from that scroll were incorporated into this image.
Necklace is essentially the same one she is wearing in the scroll.
Spiral background of the pants Guanyin is wearing in the scroll was applied to the background
Halo in the Guanyin scroll is very demure, while in my image here it’s quite radiant. I played around with both. Ultimately pulled the trigger with the vibrant yellow. That color of yellow was also chosen very specifically. It’s about frequency resonance and sound harmony. This yellow is a visual representation of 42 octaves higher than Mid C (523Hz) and is the golden yellow we can see at sunset.
In the scroll, Guanyin is also wearing several heavenly fabrics, including a long scarf coiling around her arms. I purchased a tea table runner made of silk brocade years ago with a motif called ‘Guanyin’. A photograph of the image was manipulated into the drawn image to make something that really stands out, radiating with a heavenly light.

5) Guanyin as a statue as opposed to a living goddess
Tie Guan Yin tea itself has a very interesting backstory, one that I feel I should preserve the ability to tell. Having the label represent a human made statue as opposed to a cosmic entity plays better with the storytelling side of this. Instead of making an iron goddess for the label, I must admit that I think roman sculptures are the best in the world. They’re so iconic for me. I love the detail. My favourite statue in the world is probably Benvenuto Cellini’s “Perseus Cutting off Medusa’s Head” found in the Loggia dei Lanzi, in Florence, Italy. Which I saw on my honeymoon.

I have a small Italian alabaster plate in my house of a naked woman laying down in a semi circle. It hangs outside my bedroom door. I used to serve grapes on it, very classy. When I think goddess, I first think statues; when I think statues, I think roman white marble or alabaster statues.

As it all came together, while technically challenging in many ways, this image had an air of taboo around it from the beginning. I had the concept in my mind for a while, and I asked some of my customers and close friends what they thought about the idea. I feel that of everyone I told, there was really just 1 person who didn’t say it was a bad idea. “Taking a prominent religious figure and having a statue of them masturbating is against some cosmic law.” I don’t know about you folks, but I don’t even see this image in a sexual nature anymore, it has transcended that for me. Anyway, if you had 10 arms, are you telling me you wouldn’t do this?

Alabaster Goddess is printed as 8″ x 12″ on fine art paper, it exists as a single print. If you like, I could sign it for you and write 1/1, though currently there’s no writing on it. If you’re into trying the tea, you can find it here!