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by William Glyn-Jones
This menu contains pieces exploring mysteries involving the beneath-the-surface use of constellation tableaux in art and myth.
(Greyed out means coming soon.)
TAURUS MYSTERY PART 1 – THE KNOSSOS BULL LEAPER
TAURUS MYSTERY PART 2 – YIMA AND HIS BULL IN THE LASCAUX CAVES
THE ASTRAL LOGIC OF THE DIONYSIAN ARRIVAL TABLEAU
RETURN OF THE MAIDEN IN THE ELEUSIS MYSTERIES
It is not doubted that sacred geometry was used in the Renaissance as part of the structure of compositions to imbue art with a transcendent harmony, as outlined in the Platonic and Hermetic philosophies of old, and that this same idea was used to give the classical architecture of antiquity its sense of light, harmony and beauty. The Platonic philosophy says that forms which are universal, intelligible and eternal partake of the essence of beauty from a realm of ideas that has objective existence. The fact that intelligibility, universality and antiquity should facilitate this suggests that this philosophy is speaking of more than simply a pleasing effect due to symmetry and balance. The more universal and intelligible a form or idea, the more mental resonance will occur, if there is such a realm of ideas. The closest modern scientific theory is Morphic Resonance and indeed it says the same things. It suggests that anomalies in the learning patterns of both animals and humans are due to a morphic resonance, a resonance between things of like form, be they the ideas or the creatures doing the thinking or behaving. The older the form, then, the richer the accumulation of morphic fields around it…and a deeper sense of its beauty in the perceiver? This would certainly accord with the experience people have when finding themselves before such treasures of antiquity as the acropolis or the pyramids.
Whether or not we choose to accept this, it is certainly the case that if it is true, then logically there are certain other kinds of forms which should have a similar effect to those that are geometric, and which we might thus expect to have been similarly treasured by artists adhering to the hermetic philosophy. A particularly interesting example is that of constellation patterns. They are very, very old, very slow to change, and they are effectively universal in human terms, in that the same patterns are seen in the sky across a wide range of geography. The shape of Orion for example is the same for onlookers in the northern hemisphere as it is for the people in Australia or South America.
The hermetic artist would be interested not only in the pattern itself, but also in the mythological figure projected onto that pattern, for it is the collective thought-form that they are aiming to create a resonance with, so that their art appears ancient in beauty, redolent with a timeless ancestral imprint – the Dreamtime.
It is for each individual appreciator of such art to decide whether or not they adhere to this philosophy themselves. It certainly does not appear to be impossible when looked at in terms of some scientific studies that claim to be empirical, for example those that have been written of in books like The Presence of the Past by Rupert Sheldrake. But more than that I will not say on the question of the validation of the philosophy itself.
CONTINUE THE SUGGESTED JOURNEY HERE (with the Winter Stars menu top level landing page)
HowCurious! 