Kate’s talk is called “Memories of the Ice Age in Beasts of the Southern Wild: Climate Change and Adaptation”
In her play Juicy and Delicious, Lucy Alibar’s heroine is a child facing a herd of aurochs, “as seen in cave paintings at Lascaux.” A metaphor for the child’s overwhelming fear at the imminent death of the father, the aurochs evoke the helpless terror of childhood nightmares. Alibar and director Behn Zeitlin adapted the play for the feature film Beasts of the Southern Wild, in which the theme of world-ending loss is extended to the passing of a way of life due to global warming. In both the play and the film, events in which all is about to be lost necessitate confrontation with the beast from the prehistoric caves. Impossibly distant from the contemporary world in terms of time, the painted images in the prehistoric caves hold memories and messages from the cave painting culture. This presentation reflects on the vision of the world between worlds that the play and movie offer, and on the advice that our civilization could take from the cave painters: adapt or die out.
About Kate
Kate Rittenhouse is an independent scholar and thinker now living in Vancouver, British Columbia. She holds a B.A. from Swarthmore College with a primary area of study in ancient art and culture. After leaving a successful career as a corporate manager (Saturn opposition), she studied couture sewing techniques and has pursued a career in theatrical costuming, working in theatre and film. Fulfilling a lifelong interest, in 2009 she completed a doctorate (Saturn return) in Mythological Studies with an Emphasis in Depth Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Her dissertation, Isis by Any Name: A Study Of All’s Well That Ends Well, explores the animating force of the divine feminine in the mythic and metaphoric structures of the play. Currently a chairperson of the Mythology in Contemporary Culture area of the Popular Culture Association, she writes and speaks on modern epiphanies, revisionings, and reinterpretations of ancient mythological elements.
To hear Kate’s talk and many others, join us at the Mythologium!
The Mythologium is a conference and retreat for mythologists and friends of myth, held July 29 – 31 via Zoom in the Pacific time zone.