Fremont figure, Old Airport site, Moab, Utah.
Photo Peter Faris, September 2000.
On a couple of previous occasions I have published postings
of images that I called Optical Illusions. These generally consist of images
that can be seen as more than one thing (note: also see Visual Puns). This
week’s offering is an excellent example of that phenomenon.
This image is from the old airport site near Moab, Utah, and
consists of images produced by the Fremont Culture. The panel contains a mix of
Fremont figures (anthropomorphs) and four-legged animals or quadrupeds (zoomorphs
generally identified as desert bighorn sheep). The figure that I focus on here, however, contains elements of both. The large anthropomorph to
the right of center is a traditional Fremont Classic figure with a plumed
headdress; except the plumes of the headdress are also the horns of two of the
quadrupeds standing nose to nose where the figure’s head belongs. Thus the head
and the headdress can be seen either as just that, a head with headdress, or as
two animals facing each other, or as both.
Since this image combines elements of both human and animal
features I suppose it should also be classified as therianthropic. In any case
the artist who produced this image was obviously thinking about the identifying
qualities of his figures, and combined elements of them to overlay the double
meaning or identities in the same figure. Personally, I see this as an example
of real creativity, the combining of images to make another image that has
never existed before, as well as a possibly intended joke or visual pun.
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