Zoomorphic Juncture and the
True Origin of Collage
Beauvais Lyons
Professor of Art
University of Tennessee, Knoxville

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First, contrary to the writings of most art historians, collage was not invented in the early part of this century by Pablo Picasso and George Braque. Instead, collage is a more basic, primal art form which can be traced to the earliest use of zoomorphic juncture. Zoomorphic juncture is the practice of collaging two or more animal parts to produce a hybrid. While the best known contemporary research on zoomorphic juncture has been done by Dr. Suess, we may find much earlier examples of this practice with the Assyrian Winged Bull or the Apashtian Winged Dog. Likewise, our beloved Centaur from Volos; a creature collaged from the torso of a human and the body of a horse, also serves show that collage predates the modern era.

While my revisionary analysis of the origin of collage was a popular topic at the recent College Art Association conference held in Toronto, the broader implications of this theory will be modest, given that many consider art history to be a minor branch of the humanities. However, I have a second, and even more radical claim regarding this line of inquiry. If zoomorphic juncture is a biological rather than artistic phenomena, we have a new basis to question the Theory of Evolution.

Where Charles Darwin claims that natural selection effects the biological evolution of a particular species, zoomorphic juncture provides a case for a primal creator. Call him or her God, Goddess, Allah, the Almighty, the Supreme Being or whatever, this primal creator collages animal forms to create new species.

My research on this thesis began several years ago at a Centripetal lecture on the Erustian Migrations of Nupalese Indigo Beetles presented by our dear colleague Dr. Erma Von Bueller. Prior to the talk, over a luncheon plate of cold cuts, fruit cocktail and small curd cottage cheese on a bed of iceberg lettuce, I had a memorable discussion with our University Historian Milton Klein.

Milton told me of the zoological discoveries of Dr. Hunter Nichols, a Professor of Agriculture at the University of Tennessee from 1867-1892. In 1876 Professor Nichols took a summer voyage to the Island of Tallilumbae, south-east of Balinarbi. It was there that he documented many strange and exotic creatures, among which was the Gorrillagallus equiclavatus, popularly known as the Zoosterilla. This creature was later proposed by the UT Chapter of the Jargon Society to be the new mascot of the University of Tennessee in conjunction with our centennial in 1894. At the time they commissioned a color lithograph which still hangs in this room to this day. Despite the broad support for their proposal, the University of Tennessee went without a mascot until 1953, when Smokey was named to this title through a contest sponsored by the campus Pep Club.

While Dr. Nichols Zoosterilla did not change the devotional alligence of UT sports fans, it did provide a convincing case for the significance of zoomorphic juncture, and for an alternative theory regarding species diversity. Nichols self published engravings provide an exhaustive account of over 200 hybrid species, a few of which I'll present today.

One of the most common examples of zoomorphic juncture documented by Professor Nichols is the duck-billed platapus. However, his engravings show that there are many other examples of zoomorphic juncture found at Tallilumbae , some of which resemble the centaur, including a similar primate horse combination, mans best friend in combination with a horse, and a bird horse hybrid. One question you might ask is, what does God do with all of the missing horse heads? This combination provides one answer. Of course there is the Push Me, Pull Me which Dr. Dolittle later popularized.

The implications of zoomorphic juncture are immense, and have a notable currency in light of the cloning of sheep and the human genome project. At a time when many are expressing concern about human manipulations of DNA, Professor Nichols research shows the Almighty may have also engaged in some some rather frightening combinations. This evidence suggests that God may have used the Island of Tallilumbae as his sketchbook, allowing for juxtapositions of animals which he never intended to introduce to the rest of the world. Consider this variation, which appears to combine an owl with and ostrich. These examples show that even a creative genius such as the Allah needs a place to allow for unrestrained creativity.

Many other creatures depicted by Nichols seem plausible, and may be found today in remote locations of the world. Some of these provide alternative or new explanations of animal coloring and patterning . While Professor Nichols made no effort to explain the existence of these creatures, they provide a basis for reappraising many long-standing scientific beliefs.

Nearly one third of the engravings show important new additions to the study of ornithology. In these plates, the bird head is combined with the body of a mammel such as dog , or a deer. Some early sceptics of Dr. Nichols research became believers after viewing the large number of his elegant and detailed depictions of zoomorphic juncture. The plates also show some versions where a birds head has been replaced by the head of either a deer, goat or a donkey.

If you wish to see a nearly complete set of engravings from Dr. Nichols Fauna from The Island of Tallilumbae, you can make an appointment with the Hoskins Special Collections Library here on campus. Seen first-hand, this handsome tome provides evidence that scholarship related to our centaur has a rich tradition at UTK. Professor Nichols research calls into question not only some long standing ideas in art history, but also evolutionary biology, and by implication, theology.