When I started my moth project, I made a list of all the peculiar moth names that intrigued me. The Blind-Eyed Sphinx was one of the first on the list, but I did not paint her first because–well, the Sphinx seemed like such an immense and mysterious mythological figure.
I was not sure how to approach her.
Who is the Sphinx? Where does she come from? I did a fair amount of research and came to the conclusion that nobody really knows.
The Sphinx is both a guardian of the mysteries and a mystery herself.
Before Sophocles wrote Oedipus, before the Parthenon was constructed, or Athens a ciity, before even the Great Pvramids of Giza, there was the Sphinx.
Far back into the fertile valleys of time, in the Deep Time that only the Stones re-member, She was Beloved.
She was the Goddess, the Great Mother, Life-Giver. And she was Animal–Lion, Snake, and Bird.
Her body held their mysteries and their energies, a temple unto itself.
And here is a moth, named after her, blind-eved (which actually just means her “eyes” don’t have spots). Still the little moth whispers of her mysteries, her ferocity, her sight into the Otherworld.
