A Soul Platter:

conceptual

art project

- C. Shoup

“So I moved from rural Bonfield to urban Chicago. What I immediately

realized was: “Man, the world contains a lot of variations of people.”

“My youth involved immersion in monoculture. The people surrounding

me had the same primary skin color. They shared the same primary

thoughts. They believed the same basic doctrines. They feared the

same variables that existed outside the same small geographic area.

“My college years involved immersion in diversity. Chicago was a

cornucopia of skin colors. People produced different thoughts. They

believed different things—some believed what they brought from their

origin cultures—others adopted beliefs to fit their needs. Variables were

everywhere—yet in Chicago the variables did not arouse an immediate

climate of fear.

“It was in the midst of this great exposure and budding enlightenment

that I began to devour books of literature and poetry; anthropology and

science; philosophy and religion. And the influx of new information

caused me to ask a lot of questions...”

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“I frequented used bookstores. Once at Powell’s on Lincoln, I purchased

a copy of Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy. I cannot

remember how far I made it into the text, because near the beginning

one line was waiting for me, and the very second that line entered my

brain, a lock was opened, and a flood was unleashed.

“Descartes discoursed about the human soul. He asked pointed

questions about such an object, especially wondering where it might

come from.

“It’s too much to go into, the tracing of how this lead to that. It’s suffice

to say that a stew of questions concerning the soul brewed in me.

“Then one winter evening, while looking out a bedroom window that

rattled when the El passed through Uptown, I saw a strange image in

the glass—an elusive, effervescent shape of light and shadow that

floated across the pane. And suddenly I was stunned with a big

revelation! I grabbed my sketchbook and outlined the following idea…”

A Soul Platter

“A SOUL PLATTER traveled through the universe with ten

souls. It was looking to fertilize a life form acceptable to its

needs.”

A Soul Platter

“50,000 YEARS AGO this soul platter detected life on our

planet. It pinpointed an upright walking mammal that

possessed a disposition towards tool making and a brain

able to process rapid growth.”

A Soul Platter

“THE TEN SOULS carried in the Petri dish of the soul platter

descended onto the continent of Africa, where the upright

walking mammal was located. Those ten original souls

entered ten of those hairy mammals.”

A Soul Platter

A Soul Platter

“LIKE A WHALE that returns to its birthing ground, the soul

platter returned to our planet, and found it had deposited

its ten original souls in a fertile garden. It harvested what

was now ten billion souls.”

A Soul Platter

“AND THEN ITS full self continued on into the universe.”

Gallery view for A Soul Platter