Dear friends,
Tomorrow e-flux will close for a short holiday break until January 2. Before we go, we would like to share one of our favorite paintings with you.
Painted in Ethiopia some time after 1930 by an artist who is yet to be identified,* it depicts the “Communion of Wild Animals,” sometimes also referred to as the “Society of Friends,” a theme that emerged at the time of Emperor Haile Selassie’s coronation. The painting bears an inscription: “Love one another each according to your nature and each according to your custom.”** We sincerely hope that this sentiment will prevail in our tense times.
We wish you a happy, safe, and prosperous New Year.
With warmth,
the e-flux team
*It has been proposed that this may be the work of the Ethiopian painter Balachew Yimer (1896–1957) who is known to have produced works with this theme, an example of which is in the collections of the Institute of Ethiopian Studies in Addis Ababa (J. Gnisci, 3/2021).
**The British Museum, Collection File 2022,2004.1