*Ingredients for cosmic soup
First add all time and space
Then heat these till you see a group
Of bubbles everyplace

Now keep this at a rolling boil
Add dash of elements
For it’s important that they broil
Within bubble’s extent

Next let this cosmic mixture cool
So bubbles separate
Add gravity into this pool
To give the soup some weight

Now stir in spice called energy
To give the soup some kick
Add magnetism to degree
That makes the flavor stick

Now spin the soup around the pan
Then turn pan upside down
And watch it fling across the span
Of everything around

I know it seems a bit absurd
To make soup you can’t eat
But realize what just occurred
Create is this soup’s feat*

This fractal artwork was inspired by my thoughts about the ‘big bang’ theory. Science currently hypothesizes that there are many universes in existence, with each universe being contained within it’s own time/space ‘bubble’. Given that, we need to also rethink how the original ‘big bang’ that created everything happened. This artwork conceptualizes what that event may have been like.

In this ‘big bang’ visualization, bubble universes form as time and space unfold. In my vision, not only are there bubble universes, but also subsets of universes contained within other universes… bubbles containing other bubbles. Sound far-fetched??? This is how other bubbles are found throughout all forms of nature.

Nature uses fractals to build all of its structures, as was observed years ago by Mandelbrot himself. The scientific community originally laughed at, and dismissed, Mandelbrot’s observations and mathematics, stating his ideas were crazy. Years later, these theories of Mandelbrot were finally proven. Mandelbrot is currently a tenured and respected Sterling Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Yale University. As with most brilliant minds with new insight into things, they are first thought of to be just crazy. As my dear mother would often say, ‘He who laughs first… laughs last’.

The artwork was created in Apophysis 2.08 3DHack . The original is 7200 × 4800 pixels at 300 pixels per inch. The fractal gradient was created with ApoMap, a gradient editor commonly used with Apophysis. Because the original is so large and difficult to see over the internet, I have included a few detail cutaways below. The detail cutaways are scaled at 33% of the full-size artwork.