Hand with Reflecting Sphere (Self-Portrait in Spherical Mirror)
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Image:Hand with Reflecting Sphere.jpg Hand with Reflecting Sphere (Self-Portrait in Spherical Mirror) is a lithograph print by the Dutch artist M. C. Escher which was first printed in January, 1935. It depicts a hand holding a reflective sphere. In the reflection the hand holding the sphere is revealed to be Escher’s. Self portraits in reflective, spherical surfaces are common in Escher’s work, however this image is the most prominent and famous example. In most other self portraits of this type Escher is in the act of drawing the sphere, however, in this image he is seated in a library or study passively gazing into the sphere. On the walls there are several framed pictures, one of which appears to be of an Indonesian shadow puppet.
As it is an Escher picture, it cannot be taken at face value. Problems with the picture include: the preliminary hand is holding the globe vertically, while the figure in the picture (presumably Escher) is holding his globe horizontally. Also, the bookshelf, which stretches into the interior perspective, does not appear in the 'external' space around the globe - nothing does.
One interpretation of these inversions is that the hand holding the globe may represent the hand of God, an omniscient sustainer/perceiver, who we see in ourselves when we look inwards. That we are touching the hand of our creation through introspection is the same process that occurs when one attempts a self-portrait.
We are sitting in place of the artist, looking at the artist, looking at themselves in what is an evolution of the 'Hands Drawing Hands' concept found in another of Escher's works, examining the relationship between artist and audience, creation and perception.
The picture is referenced in the science-fiction film 'The Matrix', in a scene where (having taken the red pill and his first step to deep introspection) Thomas Anderson plunges his fingers into a mirror, causing his entire body to become a hyper-real reflection of itself. It also has similarities to the palantír (Seeing Stone) of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, which puts those that touch it in direct communication with the Dark Lord, Sauron. Both examples show the process as being a particularly disturbing one, though the figure in Escher's globe appears gaping and transfixed by the experience.