This drawing was inspired by the flowers of the island of Madiera and the flowers depicted in a 3rd century AD mosaic tile of the God Oceanus that once graced the floor of a flourishing commercial enterprise in the Roman port city of Ossonoba.
The flowers on the island were in a streaming supply. Every day we saw lush, wild cacti that morphed from deep vermilion to yellow as the season passed. There were herds of birds of paradise growing maniacally by the sides of the roads, even in the middle of rainy season, the colors could not be tamed.
The mosaic blew me away because like today, a business tied to the sea wanted to use imagery, the most powerful image – the Sea God- to convey it is an indomitable maritime power.
