Searching for "Beauty"

Sheikh Mohammed bin Ahmed bin Ayass AI Hanafy, may God rest his soul in peace, says in his book "Wonders of Flowers in the Book of Ages" about Al Tha'laby: When Cain grew up, Adam, peace upon him, entrusted him with taking care of flowers and he entrusted Abel with taking care of sheep. God inspired Adam to marry off Iqlim to Abel and Liyutha to Cain. Cain refused to marry Liyutha. He said: I will not marry anyone but Iqlim since she was with me, born out of the same womb. I love her more that Abel's sister. At that time, marrying sisters was allowed, for the sake of increasing progeny. At this point, Adam said; Son, do not disobey God's orders to me. Cain said: I will not let my brother take Iqlim. Adam said: you must both go and make sacrifices to God. You should choose the best of what you have. Then you should both observe which sacrifice is accepted. The one to whom it belongs is the one who will take Iqlim. The brothers agreed to this. They went to Mecca and climbed to the top of one of its mountains. Abel made a sacrifice of one of his best sheep and Cain made a sacrifice of wheat that had not yet formed ears of grain. Cain and Abel then stood to see what their fate would be. A white cloud came down from the sky. It hovered over Cain's sacrifice then moved over to his brother Abel's sacrifice and bore it up to heavens, as God says (He accepted the sacrifice of one and not the other). Cain said to his brother: If you take her, I will kill you. I will not let you have my (beautiful) sister. I will not take your (ugly) sister. Cain puzzled over how to kill Abel. Then Diabolis (the devil), the damned, came to him in the form of some of his brothers. He took two stones off the ground, striking one with the other and breaking it in half. Cain saw this and said: Why don't I do this to Abel? He immediately got up and went to his brother who was asleep at the foot of the mountain. He took up a rock and threw it at his brother's head and killed him.

If, for the sake of argument, we accept the preceding tale as factual, it would mean that the first crime in the history of humanity was committed in the name of "beauty". But the story has various possibilities and interpretations. For instance, Iqlim could have been beautiful in Cain's eyes and not in Abel's, who agreed to marry her because he was being "diplomatic" and did not want to anger his father.

What I want to point out is that beauty of appearance is relative and the search for this relativity is an arduous task which can never be brought to a definite conclusion. As we know, things are traditionally considered ugly, have provided art with a never­ ending source of beauty. This is why I think that a work of art is the search for an elusive formula which may be impossible to capture, permanently (This is how things should be, to ensure that the work continues...) On the basis of this, it is necessary to destroy everything and to rebuild it, every time we are afflicted with a touch of creativity so as to explore every aspect of expression in a work of art.

In this series, I am still searching another form of the other body. I destroyed (killed) the previous work because it wants to impose itself on the next work. I have done this in order to arrive at another possibility of producing a work of art which might be able to provide me with a relatively new observation.