Beauties and Beasts: Enchanted Environments as Vehicle for the Creator's Self-discovery

The chapter reviews two different research projects in order to analyse how story-making and its wider socio-economical ecologies interlink with the creator’s personal narratives. The first case study reflects on the creation of two books (Antonopoulou, 2007, 2008), both of which explore the interconnected nature between fairy-tale ‘fictions’ and personal stories themed around ‘Beauty and Beast’ themed research. The second case study reviews a more recent project (2018-2019) with Professor Jack Zipes which involves the creation of ‘enchanted’ objects and spaces that also echo hidden personal narratives.

The author analyses the multiple transformations of the self during the creative process and sees the overlaying layers of these two projects similar to what Deleuze and Guattari (1987, p.588) describe as rhizomatic ‘multiplicities of becoming’ or ‘transformational’ and ‘nomadic’ multiplicities that ‘are utilized by sorcery’ (ibid). The chapter highlights how, in both cases, story-making, painting, drawing, and screen-printing had been a sanctuary that similarly to Rego’s view of the artist studio, provide a direct line to the creator’s-author’s subconscious (Willing, 2017). The analysis of these projects under the creator’s identity lens, highlights how the process of creating enchanted environments may transform the creator’s studio into an enchanted space for self-reflection.

This edited volume takes a new look at an old question: what is the relationship between beauty and monstrosity? How has the notion of beauty transformed through the years and how does it coincide with monstrous ontologies? Contributors offer an interdisciplinary approach to how these two concepts are interlinked and emphasizes the ways the beautiful and the monstrous pervade human experience.

The two notions are explored through the axis of human transformation, focusing on body, identity and gender, while questioning both how humans transform their body and space as well as how humans themselves are gradually transformed in different contexts. The pandemic, gender crisis, moral crisis, sociocultural instability, and environmental issues have redefined beauty and the relationship we have with it. Exploring these concepts through the lens of human transformation can yield valuable insights into what it means to be human in a world of constant change.

The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, archaeology, philosophy, architecture, and cultural studies.