Myths, Legends & Folklore Artist Chessin Song | Homunculus | Oil Painting

My artwork “Homunculus” is an image portraying a homunculus. A homunculus is a small human that European alchemists believed they could create using human blood and sperm inside of an airtight glass jar. The homunculus remains a creature of alchemic hypothesis and imagination because no alchemists succeeded to create him in reality. The homunculus is born from reason and science unlike a human baby conceived by emotions including love, instinct, and sexual desire. He is known to have a characteristic different from a human baby because of how he was conceived. That characteristic is that he is as knowledgeable as an adult when he is born. However, although he is intelligent, he cannot use his intelligence practically because he has a bodily condition that will cause him to die if he leaves the glass jar.

I illustrated the character of homunculus in detail using a realistic oil painting technique. The homunculus in my painting is inside of a sealed glass jar which he cannot leave. Both the fragile glass jar and the homunculus who will die if the jar is broken look vulnerable. Blood and sperm in two different glass jars mean he was created by those materials. The homunculus is clothed which also shows he is different from a human baby born as naked. Wearing clothes is related to artificiality while a naked body is associated with being natural. The homunculus wearing clothes symbolizes he is a creature manufactured artificially, not a life born naturally. The homunculus- eyes and facial expression are not baby-like but rather adult. He has an odd identity which is a baby but not baby, a human but not human.

The reason why I submitted “Homunculus” to the Linus Gallery exhibition is that he is an imaginary being appearing in an alchemic legend. His existence was believed by alchemists to have been possible although they had no way to prove it. In that way he is like other fictional beings of legend such as mermaids, fairies, and dragons. I found it interesting that humans create legends about fictional beings. Also, I wondered why they created these stories. Perhaps various human conditions such as environment, experience, and their way of thinking let them imagine certain fictitious beings. I surmise there would be specific human conditions to let human imagine homunculus. What do you think those are?

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