Ashleigh Butterworth: The 4/5 Elements

"The four elements considered the building blocks of the Earth"

After i did my presentation on Thursday i read through my feedback post it notes and one thing that kept popping up was the aesthetics of the boat look good but it needs a narrative behind it to bring it to life. When i was creating the tractor and the boat style frame i thought of maybe using the four elements as a starting point to the narrative so i have been looking into the meaning of each elements, where they have comefrom and how different cultures use/see them differently. The first thing i came across was that in a few cultures such as in Greek and Indian unlike the four states-of-matter describe matter the fifth element describes that which is beyond the material world this also occurs in Japan (Earth, Air, Water, Fire and Spirit). This is something completely new for me as i thought there were only 4 elements and i would presume that this would be the same for many people. I think this 'spirit' element would be nice to add into the animation as it contrasts with the 4 original elements and i could find some beautiful symbolism to portray this.

I also had a look into Analogy of the elements and this is what i found -

AIR-Thought
FIRE-Desire

WATER-Emotions
EARTH-Stability

This is why we may have sayings such as -
Cool breeze of reason (Air)
Flames of passion (Fire)
Swamped by emotions (Water)
Solid as a rock (Earth)
The Chinese on the other hand have a different 5th element that being metaland they are understood to be types of energy constantly interacting with each other similar to how earth, wind, air and fire interact with each other to create our planet. The Chinese also see these elements in two different cycles - a generation/creation cycle and an overcoming/destruction cycle almost a symbolism of life and death.
This is how the cycles are believed to work -

Generating

Wood feeds fire
Fire creates earth (ash)
Earth bears metal
Metal collects water
Water nourishes wood

Overcoming

Wood parts earth
Earth absorbs water
Water quenches fire
Fire melts metal
Metal chops wood

Also the 5 elements within the Chinese culture also play an important part in Chinese Astrology and the Chinese form of Geomancy known as Feng Shui which is very popular in our culture today.

I also looked into how the four elements fit in with Astrology (Horoscopes) ... the elements are split between the horoscopes giving the different signs traits relating to the human form.