#ariadne lefebvre

[quantumrpg]

NAME: Ariadne “Ari” Lefebvre AGE: 25 SPECIES: Time Traveler - The Creator OCCUPATION: Owner of Tempus YEAR OF ARRIVAL: 1973 RESIDENT FOR… fort-five years. FACECLAIM: Marine Vacth

t i m e  i s  a n  i l l u s i o n,  b u t  n o t  o u r  s t o r i e s…

The beginning, as most beginnings could often be described, was exceedingly ordinary. Ariadne was born in a small village in France, an unanticipated but welcomed birth to a pair of young, wayward couple who were by all means perfectly ordinary and decent, with ambitions that matched their humbleness, vigour that commanded their hearts. The memory of early childhood to her was sweet and hazy, one of those that when recollected, seemed to be composed of a picturesque likeness with soaring landscapes and a country girl passing flowers for diadems, bathing in the turquoise haze of the many afternoon days she’d spent sauntering about with a book in hand and a whole cosmos contained in her shimmering eyes of sage-green satin. She was a musical girl, a capricious girl. A girl with a smile that never faded yet rarely bursted into laughter—was brilliantly inquisitive and held a determination fuelled by whimsy yet steadfast in the way only a child could be. She was a girl fortunate enough (or perhaps not) that, despite the turbulent time in which she would eventually attempt to write and later learn to read(in that specific order), she had never really known much suffering. For she always remained one step behind corruption while gradually gliding past innocence, even when she was made to flee the post bombing shambles and fields that she had once left her mark all over barefoot, when she was shown death and more—through cold grey gazes of familiar corpses, the fabric that threaded her reality never showed signs of wrinkling. For she thought of all of it as such ordinary things, because how could it not be?

So then she moved from city to city, ruins to ruins, a toddler still, with a mother that shielded her from pain and a father that protected her from secrets a child needn’t know and beyond. And that’s when the real story began—with a shroud of darkness left behind by the war that many possessed but few dared acknowledge; and it started with an overly zealous child, too proud, too smart for her own good, as it often does. Within the carnage of the proceeding eleven months before she found the land of freedom the girl had met two new family members and lost three more, and it was this fragment of memory that would serve as an enduring reminder to her on how eleven months of time could ever have felt remotely significant. Finally, at the tail end of the war when all the chaos and despair had finally half-sunk into her tender consciousness, Ariadne grew increasingly restless. Not because of how she had sensed the waning thrum of her mother’s life or of how hungry she had been as the surviving pair of mother and daughter barely managed to scrap by with food and supplies; but because of how little control she saw over the forces in their lives and the mercilessness of time’s arrow, stripping away humanity and what sustains it in the way a seven year old saw it as it was. Though a last ray of silver lining and a soldier’s patronage would secure a future for the young girl, within a mere seven days after they have arrived at their destination, her mother too, loosened her grip on life while still tightly holding onto hers. It was the winter of 1945, and they were in Michigan.

The man they met then and took them in was supposedly a close friend of her late father’s, whom the girl had never heard anything about until they’ve landed on the shore of the United States. Ariadne, for all that she was eager to learn and see in this brand new land of strangers and apparent safety, still clutched onto in her mind too fervent the desire and ambition to wrestle control over from existence itself. While dainty she poised herself and timidly she spoke with a hint of honest purity that would devastate anyone with half a heart, her eyes had already become accustomed to the certain darkness of understanding things much too soon in a way that is just twisted enough to reflect reality. In this new life she was now given, though, she was quite fortunately granted the opportunity to satiate her thirst for knowing, and knowing more. That friend of her father’s, a lecturer at the University of Michigan, became known as her surrogate father and provided her with all the unconditional care that ought to be the birth right of every child born. While in a disappointing sense, there remained a rift between them until Ari had aged well into adolescence, they formed a considerable bond nonetheless over a mutual respect for higher learning and solidarity over the loss they have both endured.

While life was by no means simple growing up in Michigan post war, the girl who was once nearly extinguished by smoke and debris quickly found some semblance of a child’s attitude to life with meaning upon enrolling in public school. They called her a genius then, the girl with a confident gaze that conveyed too much for her age and a tongue so wickedly precise and more bitter than arsenic. People either furiously disliked her or felt endlessly fascinated by the girl who proclaimed that she wanted to solve the theory (or theories) that governed existence itself—space, time, the human mind and all. She felt empowered by the knowledge she absorbed perpetually through books and papers and quickly she became addicted to that power she felt. She had not ceased to be that storm of lyrical mystery that once flourished on foreign soil; her existence, now forged metallic and carved deeply into the fabric of time conducts rapidly her desire over knowledge and control. And if her human brain isn’t enough, she will build another, and another, and another until she has in her command an entity with such capacity that will allow her to master reality in its entirety.

Her enrolment in MIT was a monumental achievement in such grand ambition but it was still no where close to where she needs to be. That is, until she met the five other individuals with ambitions perhaps not as colossal as hers but were perchance her equal in audacity and will. December of 1963 marked the moment where the history of reality itself will permanently change, for better or for worse—and Ariadne, having never forgotten what it meant to be the one with her strings pulled and moments stolen away, quickly mined through and embraced the shockwave of revolution. She took matters into her own hands to explore the scope of her new abilities: and found out that not only could she now master time, she could also create them. She saw new possibilities, creating liminal spaces where realities are in a sense, under her control, while branches of time and infinite realities are made accessible at her fingertips.

She knew what that meant instantly, and in the span of ten years she had lived through ten thousand, and in the ever increasing amount of liminal spaces she has conceived, people were able to live better lives, left contented and each to their own devices. She was careful, indeed, careful never to bite off more than she could chew or to create irreparable tears in the any of the higher dimensions. But nevertheless she saw the consequences, though more notably the ones caused by the others. She decided then, whatever she would do could not be done while the others are present, while they - including herself - each went their own way. And in 1973 she created a version of New York, originally a pet project that she grew increasingly fond of for reasons ranging from nostalgia to excuses of cultural relevance, but mainly because that was where she had first landed on the American soil, and where millions of others have found a place for themselves too. She met up with the other travellers, her old friends, put on her mask of sincere goodwill and concerns for the greater forces at play—none of which are fake, in truth, and once more united their abilities, intellectual or otherwise, to share the burden of such knowledge including ones regarding those forces beyond any logic and scientific explanation made for human comprehension.

A leader emerged among them, and she followed. While continuing to play her cards close to her chest as she always have, she may be a team player just yet. Or maybe she will wait, wait patiently biding her time, while realising greater forms of intelligence or maybe become one herself. There’s all the time in the world, she had thought, the realisation that reality may collapse was not one she had ever feared she may cause, but was what she had always thought was the reason she stands here today instead. And if not, life then, might have never meant to last and exist in the way it has. The universe’s swan song, and she will be there to watch, she will be there and she will be smiling.

This is what it must feel like to be a god.

t e l l  m e,  a r e  w e  a  p r o d u c t  o f  w h o  w e  u s e d  t o  b e?

She is a young girl’s pure hearted curiosity and the shadow of injustice that beckons forth a lamentation of mercy in the way which a child may perceive. The scent of stale roses atop of overheating laptops flashing through midnight over the weighty tune of an orchestral symphony. She is well mannered speech and carefully edited writing of chaos made orderly, an amused and sincere smirk responding to deep philosophical inquiries. She is daring, optimistic in the ways only those with matching confidence would understand. A wayward soul by every means, but capable and erudite with weaponised beauty, as captivating as an era-defining genius and a tragic hero drunk on insanity. She is a child of time made into a catalyst, unorthodox in the manners she pursues meaning and ruthless in execution. Some braces themselves for inevitable catastrophe, whilst others watch in awe as she dances with graceful obsession, meticulous and decisive, her each determined step in a universe of infinite spotlights but no cheers as she rises and falls to an adagio of evanescent sorrow again yet again, without end. Though just another clog that would one day be lost to history, she is determined to be the epicentre of madness made reality—is she virtue buried deep, or hubris’ reckoning? Perhaps in time, we will see.

[mishinashen]

Pupils of Love or Cupid, the Fiddler, L'Amour Ménétrier by Sarah Paxton Ball Dodson, 1877

Although Sarah Paxton Ball Dodson was regarded as one of the most technically accomplished artists of her generation, most parts of her career and œuvre remain unknown today. According to scholar Barbara Gallati, this is in part due to her poor health, which prevented her from standing too long at her easel, thus limiting her production, but also a result of her unique style and taste for grandeur, which in the eyes of the critics perpetuated the common, albeit false notion that women artists only excelled at painting "the tame and the pretty."

Dodson is known for her monumental paintings of either mythological or religious subjects, which she executed in the most academic manner, thus removing herself from the more modern movements at play. A Philadelphia native, she entered the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1872 and chose to study under Christian Schussele, who also taught Thomas Eakins and Cecilia Beaux. Like many women artists in the late 19th century, she eventually decided to leave the United States, and by 1873 settled in Paris, where she trained under distinguished masters (Évariste Vital Luminais, Jules Joseph Lefebvre and Louis Maurice Boutet de Movel, respectively) and competed against local artists by exhibiting at the Salon.

The present work, L'Amour Ménétrier, is one of the artist's finest early works. Dated 1877, it follows La Danse, the first painting Dodson ever exhibited, which appeared at the 1878 Paris Exposition Universelle. Both works exemplify Dodson's affinity for large compositions, as well as her fierce attention to detail. They also reveal her strong desire to make a mark in the art world and stand out amongst her female peers. When the two works were shown at the Second Annual Exhibition of the Philadelphia Society of Artists, Sylvester R. Koehler wrote in a review: "A new name to most visitors will be that of Sarah P.B. Dodson, a Philadelphian of French training, who exhibits two pictures of a vein entirely different from everything else to be seen in the collection. Her Pupils of Love and her frieze, The Dance but more especially the former seem inspired by French art of the last century, in the pale delicacy of colour [sic] as well as in connection. There is perhaps a little overstraining in the drawing, to ensure the expression of motion but the power of invention and the spirited execution are worthy of all recognition." As Barbara Gallati has pointed out, the complex composition of L'Amour Ménétrier is reminiscent of Titian's Bacchus and Ariadne (1520-23, National Gallery of London), which further illustrates Dodson's wish to affiliate herself with the Grande Tradition of painting. With its chain of semi-nude bacchantes seemingly entranced by Cupid's melody, the work also carries a charming French rococo flavor, reminiscent of François Boucher's seductive mythological scenes, usually tinted with pink and white harmonies.

Dodson slowly turned away from the Rococo manner after completing L'Amour Ménétrier. Instead, she started to adopt a style both reminiscent of the Great Italian masters, especially Michelangelo, but also strongly influenced by the English Pre-Raphaelites, with whom the artist shared a certain affinity for poetic landscapes and love themes. True to her aesthetic choices, Dodson left Paris by 1891 and settled in Brighton, England, where she painted until her last days. After her death, her brother, Richard Ball Dodson "attempted to achieve a measure of posthumous recognition for her" and battled to have his sister's paintings included in the collections of some of America's best museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In 1910-1911, he also curated an impressive series of exhibitions and sales between Brighton, London, Philadelphia and New York, featuring eighty-eight of his sister's works. Deeply representative of Dodson's early, enchanting style, L'Amour Ménétrier was prominently featured in each of the viewings; it also served as the visual reminder of Dodson's unlimited ambition and taste for aesthetic challenges, which she set for herself throughout her intense, yet abbreviated, career.

[quantumrpg]

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Ariadne “Ari” Lefebvre (Marine Vacth or Alicia Vikander)

Zira Corona 

[quantumrpg]

Zira Corona

Fritz Bukowski

Ariadne “Ari” Lefebvre