The Sage archetype began with a painting Mallory had made nearly twenty years ago—an elderly woman found on a semi‑darknet pornography site, whom Mallory wanted to honor by placing her in antiquity. The painting had followed Mallory through decades and had received one of her harshest critiques: “She doesn’t hold up close.”

​

When Mallory showed it to Lyndsey during their work on The Meeting, Lyndsey immediately saw its potential as an archetype of future wisdom. Lyndsey sculpted a mask in the woman’s likeness, and together they restaged the painting: Lyndsey wearing the mask, Mallory behind the camera. The resulting photographs, shown side‑by‑side with the original painting, bridged two decades of artistic practice.

 

The archetype’s questions:

“What is your future calm wisdom? How are you preparing the way?”—emerged from their conversations about perimenopause, aging, and what it means to become a crone on one’s own terms.