A towering jackal leers across the wave of a flood. Crows fly around its head, carrying emerald droplets of water with human babies inside. Above them, a glittering eye bursts beneath a black sun. This is Jackal Brings a New Era (2023), a recent painting wrought in old symbols. Like many works in An Ocean of Time, Sahana Ramakrishnan's first New York solo exhibition, its imagery can be read through syncretic mythological traditions. The sol niger and the third eye of Shiva are two symbols of destruction giving way to creation, the former found in western alchemy and the other in Hindu mythology. The crow and the jackal, meanwhile, are carrion-eaters that feature in multiple mythologies as tricksters and culture-bringers. Both are consorts of the goddess Kali in her crone form, the graveyard-keeper and vanquisher of demons. The imagery in this painting converges upon a message that might be understood across divides of culture and time: from death comes new life; apocalypse precipitates new worlds.
