Goddes of Masks [Götten der Masken]

The One who bears the writhing crown stands before you, silent sentinel of truths too piercing to behold with unshielded eyes. Neither monster nor victim, existing in the liminal space between divine punishment and sacred wisdom, keeper of the gaze that transforms all who dare to meet it.

Once feared and misunderstood, this ancient power comes to us across millennia as a guardian of thresholds. The One who was cursed with serpents for hair and eyes that turn the living to stone reveals herself not as horror but as necessary darkness on the path to wisdom.

In the realm of shadows where her whispers echo, she teaches us about the masks we craft with such care.

This sculpture represents our collective relationship with that which we cannot bear to see. The silent screams of recognition when we glimpse our true reflection. The instinctive turning away. The stone that grows within our hearts when we refuse to acknowledge our own monstrosity and beauty.

Have you ever looked as deeply into yourself? 

Between the threads of waking and dreaming, this one is eternally waiting—our keeper of forbidden knowledge, patient as the ancient stones themselves.

What mysteries lie coiled in her gaze? What wisdom writhes upon her head? What truths might we discover if we dared to look directly at that which society has taught us to fear?

The serpents that crown her are not punishment but illumination—each one a current of intuitive knowing that extends beyond the rational mind. They sense what the eyes cannot see, feel what the hands cannot touch, and know what the intellect cannot grasp.

In other terms.... this one stands as the ultimate symbol of the terrifying face of transformation—the necessary death of the ego before rebirth into authenticity.

She asks of us: What would you become if you ceased turning away from your reflection? What stone figures populate the garden of your denied self? What power might you reclaim if you embraced the parts of yourself labelled monstrous?

Our masks eventually fail us. Our carefully constructed personas crack and fall away. The stone we become through denial is ultimately more painful than the momentary petrification of honest self-confrontation. Yet through this apparent meaninglessnessshines something deeper—a profound affirmation. For in facing her, in enduring her gaze, we discover that transformation rather than destruction awaits. The stone is temporary. The wisdom however, is eternal. This oracle of the shadowed face invites you to a different kind of seeing. To look upon your reflection not with the eyes of judgment but with the thousand sensing tentacles of her crowned serpents—to feel rather than analyze, to know rather than categorise, to embrace rather than separate. The sacred integration comes not through intellectual understanding but through surrender to the mystery of your own multiplicity. The golden antlers that rise from her temple represent the reaching of consciousness beyond conventional boundaries—intuition extending into realms typically hidden from waking awareness.

Those who place this sculpture in their homes invite her challenging presence into their lives. She stands as sentinel and guide, reminding us that our greatest fears often guard our greatest treasures. That beneath the masks we wear to please, to protect, to perfect—lies a wild wisdom waiting to be reclaimed.

The silver crystals that adorn her form catch light even in darkness, suggesting that illumination comes not despite our shadows but through them. The cold soapstone base grounds her transformative energy in the physical realm, bridging the gap between mystical insight and embodied knowing.

At 45 centimetres tall, she stands just high enough to meet your gaze when seated in contemplation—an invitation to the courageous act of seeing and being seen.

Some will turn away from her presence, uncomfortable with her silent challenge. Others will feel drawn to her again and again, sensing that in her seemingly destructive power lies the seed of a deeper wholeness.

In acknowledging her, we honour the darkest and most powerful aspects of the psyche, not as something to be conquered or controlled, but as a primordial force to be integrated. For it is only when we cease turning our most difficult truths to stone that we ourselves become fully alive.

Place her where shadows and light intermingle. Visit her in those twilight moments when certainty fails and questions arise. Let her serpentine wisdom whisper to you of all the selves you might become if you dared to remove your final mask.