Untitled 

Zdzislaw Beksinski painted this untitled work, and it confronts us with stark symbols of desolation. We see a lone, barren tree set against an ominous sky. Fire is a motif that has coursed through human imagination for eons, representing destruction, purification, and transformation, appearing from the funeral pyres of antiquity to the apocalyptic visions of the modern age. The rigid geometric form hovering above the scene, perhaps a source of this oppressive light, recalls ancient ziggurats or sacrificial altars. One can find echoes of such shapes in various cultures, symbolizing the intersection of the earthly and the divine, from the Tower of Babel to modern skyscrapers. The tree itself, stripped bare, evokes Yggdrasil, the World Tree of Norse mythology, or the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden. In this context, the barren tree is not just a plant, but a symbol, a conduit for collective nightmares and primeval anxieties, engaging us on a subconscious level. The symbol has undergone constant metamorphosis, resonating in the collective unconscious, haunting the dreams of humanity across time.