Oil on canvas 50x70cm (2026) #9 of DEVOUR: a year-long project of reading and responding by Rocketgirl (one per month) This painting is an abstract reflection on the book 'Garden of Eden' by Ernest Hemmingway "The sun was hot and the air was clear and the sea was very blue." - Ernest Hemmingway, Garden of Eden DEVOUR IX: MUTATIO interprets the emotional residue of the book rather than its narrative — the heaviness, the hidden knowledge, the quiet rupture between loss and what refuses to be lost. The work offers a gesture toward the moment when beauty becomes an act of defiance.