Odyssey in Neon — Caroline Esbenshade

Odyssey in Neon (2017)

public art installation, neon sign
variable, sign is 32x100cm

Odyssey in Neon (2017) was s a site-specific installation consisting of a red neon sign reading ‘O Muse’, installed in the historic weighbridge on Watton Street, Werribee, Victoria. The phrase references the opening line of Homer’s Odyssey, in which the narrator invokes the Muse—the divine embodiment of creativity—to help tell the story of Odysseus’s long and arduous journey home from the Trojan War.

O Divine Poesy, goddess, daughter of Zeus,
sustain for me this song of the various-minded man who,
after he had plundered the innermost citadel of hallowed Troy,
was made to stay grievously about the coasts of men,
the sport of their customs, good and bad,
while his heart, through all the sea-faring,
ached with an agony to redeem himself and bring his company safe home.
Vain hope – for them.
The fools!
Their own witlessness cast them aside.
To destroy for meat the oxen of the most exalted Sun,
wherefore the Sun-god blotted out the day of their return.
Make this tale live for us in all its many bearings, O Muse.

Caroline Esbenshade

Odyssey in Neon (2017)

– from Homer’s Odyssey, translation by T.E. Lawrence

Caroline
Esbenshade