Self in 4 Directions: DSC

I wanted to share with you a self-portrait that I did as part of a workshop with Embodied Astrology, called Self in 4 Directions.

This portrait was inspired by the "descendant" or DSC in tropical astrology. This traditionally marks the point in the sky that is setting at the time of birth, and represents relationships.

I decided to include bees in this piece because of their "relationships" with plants!

The plant I collaged into this photo is a Locust Berry - an endemic plant to South Florida. It produces oil as well as pollen, attracting specialist oil-collecting bees like the beautiful and also endemic Centris Errans (also called Wandering Centris. I love the name but I don't know why it's called that).

This plant also "hosts" the endangered dusky-wing skipper butterfly, but butterfly-plant relationships are more parasitic and I figured that would be the wrong metaphor.

Below on the left is another idea I tried out for the Descendant piece, exploring some of the symbolism of my particular chart placements, but I didn’t like it as much. On the right is the original Locust Berry painting that I used! (painted in 2018)

Here's my chart, showing the Ascendant point (circled in green) and Descendant point (circled in blue)

Check out the other pics from this series:

IC Portrait

MC Portrait