Mixed media by Julia Datchenko

This papercut is a parable about the moment of creation, when the first movement, the first breath emerges from darkness. The snake maintains balance between the past and the future. Ouroboros is one of the oldest symbols of eternity, the continuity of life, and the cycle of birth and death. In the Slavic and Indo-European worldview, this image is associated with the guardian of world order, who embraces the earth so that the world does not fall apart. Here, he is both the Beginning and the End, the moment when everything is still indivisible. The arrow trees symbolize life breaking through the earth, the movement from chaos to creation. Their sharp tips are a sign of the energy of growth, the force that breaks through the circle of frozen time. This is the contrast between the eternal and the instantaneous, between the closed cycle and the urge for a new beginning.