(2024) The Songs of Olop is an experimental book with verses telling the birth of the Skin Goddess. The narrative encompasses various versions of the verses and is accompanied by depictions of the verses and drawings of excavated artefacts related to the song.
Below is an edited version of the Songs of Olop.
[Verse 1] She was born of the quiet waters that travelled from the sea to the land, where salted and fresh water met, on the banks of a river where the Tree of Life grew. [Verse 2] On the day when the Tree of Life caught or didn’t catch fire, flames arose in the canopy. On the tree was a seed with the hardest shell, the seed with tiny eyes that would witness her birth.
[Verse 3] The seed fell in the water, sank and settled in the sediments. Catfish and salamanders visited the seed and danced around it for three days and three nights until it grew roots.
[Verse 4] On the fourth day a plant grew from the roots of the seed. Pods sprouted from its stem in great number and symmetry. Each pod sheltered an eye and each eye was a deity. [Verse 5] In the depth of the river, the plant caught fire as it remembered the fire in the canopy and the deities were forced to leave their pods. [Verse 6] The seed itself was ripe and soft and it split open. The goddess Olop emerged as all the deities present witnessed her birth.
[Verse 7] As the plant kept on burning, its incandescent ashes turned into a salamander. Her name was Fÿr and she was the Olop’s sister.
THE SKIN PROJECT 