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ANTHOGRAMS AND APHRODITE’S GARDEN
The sacred garden and the association of Aphrodite/love/fertility with flowers and fruit is a subject that I have been concerned with for some time.
The manuscripts of Mount Athos, Byzantine Art having always been one of the influences in my work, provided the basic format for the garden, a shape that is both a cross and a flower and is often used to frame a title or in a more complex form, to contain a whole page of religious text.
A wish to replace these texts with a new language relevant to Aphrodite led me to further readings.  Inspired  by Meleager’s Stephanos and his association of poetry with flowers and trees, the idea emerged for creating an alphabet based on flowers.  These symbols I named anthograms and the writing, anthography.  Further, I searched for more references to flowers, especially in connection with Aphrodite, in ancient Greek poetry.  A list of flowers, trees, fruit, derived from this poetry, was added to references in other writings on the subject of the goddess.  To this was added visual information from ancient pottery, jewellery, etc.  Furthermore, seeing what grows in and around the sanctuary of Aphrodite at Kouklia today, illuminates the ancient writings and also contributes fresh material for my work”.

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