Makom
"the Place"
and the Milwaukee "Place" Photography Projects
The place of recognition . . . the final stage of meditation . . .
Introductionand the Milwaukee "Place" Photography Projects
The place of recognition . . . the final stage of meditation . . .
is the goal of your [inner, yogic] search. When you reach
this place, the world will reveal its divine mystery
before your eyes. . . then you will remember
the Upanishadic mantra: "It is God who
pervades the form of the universe."
Swami Muktananda, The Perfect Relationship
I discovered the concept of Makom in the book by Thomas Hess, entitled Barnett Newman (1971). Hess introduced the Jewish concept Makom in an attempt to explain Newman's life transforming experience in 1949 while visiting several Native American Indian Mounds in Ohio. Newman (b. 1905 - 1970), one of truly great New York School abstract painters of the 1960's, whose work is the very embodiment of a meditative state of mind, tried to write about his experience in an unpublished 1949 monologue entitled "Prologue for a New Esthetic." Here is a brief except:
"Standing before the Miamisburg mound, or walking amidst the Fort Ancient and Newark earthworks--surrounded by these simple walls of mud--I was confounded by the absoluteness of the sensation, their self-evident simplicity . . . "
Hess informs us of a later conversation he had with Newman in which the painter describes in more personal detail what he felt:
" . . . a sense of place, a holy place. Looking at the site you feel, Here I am, here . . . and out beyond there [beyond the limits of the site] there is chaos, nature, rivers, landscapes . . . but here you get a sense of your own presence . . . "
In Hess's book, published in 1971, he offers an interpretation of Newman's 1949 experience of the mounds in Ohio based on a later statement Newman had written, in 1963, regarding an architectural model he had created for a synagogue in which he used the words Makom and mound. Hess refers to the word Makom at first only parenthetically, then later, he goes on to define it:
Newman evidently was alluding to the Jewish concept of Makom, of "place" or "location" or "site" (Newman refers directly to [Makom] in a 1963 statement about his model for a synagogue, in which the temple itself is designated as Makom, and he calls the "place" where members of the congregation stand to read from the Torah a "mound").
Hess continues:
Makom is place. Hamakom is, literally, "the place." It is also one of the secret names of God and one of the poetic locutions which the Torah uses to avoid pronouncing [God's] name or spelling out its letters. Thus Moses would not say: "The Lord spoke to me . . . " but "The Place spoke to me. . . "
For the early Kabbalists, as for Aristotle, "place" and "space" were identical. There was no such thing as an abstract, metaphysical "space." Everything was "place," even heaven, and for the Jews "the place" is imbued with the transcendental presence of God. (Thomas Hess from the 1971 publication Barnett Newman)
*
This brief account of Newman's encounter with his own sacred Presence amongst the Ohio Native Indian Mounds struck me in a very personal, revelatory, transformative way when I read Hess's book as a graduate Student in the early 1972. It seemed as if I was recognizing some essential truth that had already existed within me. And this is precisely what Carl Jung's idea of synchronicity is about, and what Stieglitz's idea of equivalence is about.
For the early Kabbalists, as for Aristotle, "place" and "space" were identical. There was no such thing as an abstract, metaphysical "space." Everything was "place," even heaven, and for the Jews "the place" is imbued with the transcendental presence of God. (Thomas Hess from the 1971 publication Barnett Newman)
*
This brief account of Newman's encounter with his own sacred Presence amongst the Ohio Native Indian Mounds struck me in a very personal, revelatory, transformative way when I read Hess's book as a graduate Student in the early 1972. It seemed as if I was recognizing some essential truth that had already existed within me. And this is precisely what Carl Jung's idea of synchronicity is about, and what Stieglitz's idea of equivalence is about.
(Note: I focused my 1972 MFA written thesis on Jung's ideas of synchronicity and the symbol, and Stieglitz's idea of equivalence. See my blog pages dedicated the Symbol and my written thesis: The Symbolic Photograph : A Means To Self Knowledge. I made no mention of Makom in my thesis.)
My discovery of the Makom concept awakened memories of my early childhood days in a small town in Ohio named Piqua, which is a Shawnee place name taken from a local Shawnee clan's creation story which tells of "a man who rose from the ashes." I remember seeing elementary school plays that reenacted this mystery story. And though the Indian mounds in Miamisburg are only an hour's drive away from Piqua, and though I have no memory of ever visiting those mounds, I did have--in my back yard in Ohio--my very own "sacred mound site."
Two snapshots (made by my mom?) of the"mound" next to her flower bed; and me and "my" block at the corner of our neighbor's garage
After reading about Makom, and Newman's experience at the Indian mounds, I believe practically every photograph I have ever made since then has been influenced by the idea, and, indeed, by my experience of Makom: "the 'Place' where God is present." My desire to make a photograph would be often sparked by the subtle awareness of a divine presence in the place or thing or event I was perceiving. And after the picture was printed, and I had carefully contemplated the image, if I did not experience that sense of holy presence in the photograph, I would usually discard the photograph.
(Note: snapshots of my childhood's backyard, including the ones above, and rereading Hess's book about Barnett Newman later in 1978 initiated an important photography project The Negative Print Series which I will write more about later, below.)
In the spring of 1975, three years before I read the Barnett Newman book a second time, I was invited to come to Milwaukee for an interview regarding a teaching position in photography. One of the Art faculty was driving me around the area near the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, showing me the sites. We stopped and got out of the car and walked toward the edge of a very high bluff that overlooked Lake Michigan. When I stood before that vast, awesome space . . . of water, light and sky . . . I experienced my heart leaping out into that space which seemed so palpably filled with a luminous sacred presence. My entire being became enlivened by the experience; and in that moment I secretly promised myself that if I was offered the teaching position in Milwaukee I would photograph the Lake until I was able to created a body of work that functioned as a visual equivalent for that deeply heartfelt experience. (I did get that teaching job in 1975: see my project The Lake Series 1981-82.)
In 1987 my wife Gloria and I met for the first time Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, a yogic saint from India, in a two day yoga meditation program. Her teacher, Swami Muktananda, had established an ashram in New York State, and at the time of his death (1982) he passed the power of the Siddha Lineage on to his disciple, Gurumayi. Since then she has served as the living head of the Siddha Yoga Path.
In that meditation program with Gurumayi I had an intense experience of her grace, her transcendent state of being. My experience was located in two "places" simultaneously: I felt the divine presence within my own Self--in my Heart--and within Gurumayi. (For a full detailed account of this experience, visit my project: Photography and Yoga)
After that experience with Gurumayi, Gloria and I committed ourselves to the practices of Siddha Yoga Meditation and we have continued the practices to this day. It has occurred to me recently that every meaningful event that has occurred within my Creative Process in Photography--beginning with my Epiphany as a ten year old boy; my attraction to Stieglitz's idea of the Equivalent; my fascination with Jung's ideas of the Self, the Symbol, the concept of Synchronicity and then my discovery of the concept of Makom--all this had been preparing me, it now seems to me, for my life-transforming meeting with Gurumayi and Siddha Yoga Meditation.
There occurred a gradual merging over the years of my practice of photographic picture-making with my practices of Siddha Yoga Meditation. The experience of the divine presence has extended into all aspects of my everyday life; and my Creative Process as a person and as a photographer have become more and more clearly focused on the Oneness of Being. Indeed, the symbolic photograph is the very embodiment, visually, of the Oneness of Being.
from The Lake Series 1981-82 (click on the image to enlarge)
In the spring of 1975, three years before I read the Barnett Newman book a second time, I was invited to come to Milwaukee for an interview regarding a teaching position in photography. One of the Art faculty was driving me around the area near the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, showing me the sites. We stopped and got out of the car and walked toward the edge of a very high bluff that overlooked Lake Michigan. When I stood before that vast, awesome space . . . of water, light and sky . . . I experienced my heart leaping out into that space which seemed so palpably filled with a luminous sacred presence. My entire being became enlivened by the experience; and in that moment I secretly promised myself that if I was offered the teaching position in Milwaukee I would photograph the Lake until I was able to created a body of work that functioned as a visual equivalent for that deeply heartfelt experience. (I did get that teaching job in 1975: see my project The Lake Series 1981-82.)
*
In 1987 my wife Gloria and I met for the first time Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, a yogic saint from India, in a two day yoga meditation program. Her teacher, Swami Muktananda, had established an ashram in New York State, and at the time of his death (1982) he passed the power of the Siddha Lineage on to his disciple, Gurumayi. Since then she has served as the living head of the Siddha Yoga Path.
In that meditation program with Gurumayi I had an intense experience of her grace, her transcendent state of being. My experience was located in two "places" simultaneously: I felt the divine presence within my own Self--in my Heart--and within Gurumayi. (For a full detailed account of this experience, visit my project: Photography and Yoga)
After that experience with Gurumayi, Gloria and I committed ourselves to the practices of Siddha Yoga Meditation and we have continued the practices to this day. It has occurred to me recently that every meaningful event that has occurred within my Creative Process in Photography--beginning with my Epiphany as a ten year old boy; my attraction to Stieglitz's idea of the Equivalent; my fascination with Jung's ideas of the Self, the Symbol, the concept of Synchronicity and then my discovery of the concept of Makom--all this had been preparing me, it now seems to me, for my life-transforming meeting with Gurumayi and Siddha Yoga Meditation.
There occurred a gradual merging over the years of my practice of photographic picture-making with my practices of Siddha Yoga Meditation. The experience of the divine presence has extended into all aspects of my everyday life; and my Creative Process as a person and as a photographer have become more and more clearly focused on the Oneness of Being. Indeed, the symbolic photograph is the very embodiment, visually, of the Oneness of Being.
The Early Milwaukee "Place" projects
I have lived in many "places" throughout my life: Piqua, Ohio; Portland, Indiana; Rochester, New York; Chicago, Illinois; New York City; Albuquerque, New Mexico; Atlanta, Georgia; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and currently I live in Canandaigua, New York. Each of these place names--of human settlements--represents an essential aspect of my unfolding life as a Creative Process; each place has had its own unique character, its own historical, sociological, psychological and physiological identities; and each has impacted my life in important, probably necessary ways.
I lived and taught and helped my wife raise our two children in Milwaukee, Wisconsin over a period of 33 years--from 1975 to 2007, when I retired from teaching and then a year later moved to Canandaigua, NY. I lived in Milwaukee longer than in any other place I have ever lived. In the first fifteen of those 33 years I created seven projects that are (in varying ways) about Milwaukee as a "Place." In 1999-2001 I added an additional project. Here is the list of projects:
I lived and taught and helped my wife raise our two children in Milwaukee, Wisconsin over a period of 33 years--from 1975 to 2007, when I retired from teaching and then a year later moved to Canandaigua, NY. I lived in Milwaukee longer than in any other place I have ever lived. In the first fifteen of those 33 years I created seven projects that are (in varying ways) about Milwaukee as a "Place." In 1999-2001 I added an additional project. Here is the list of projects:
The Persephone Series, 1975-76
The Steve Lacy Series, 1977-78 is included in my list of Milwaukee "Place" projects primarily because the subject matter I photographed (East Side street scenes, neighborhood front yards, back yards, alleys, etc.) related to Milwaukee as a Place. However "Place" in terms of Makom was not on my mind when I was working on that particular project; the music of Steve Lacy had inspired the photographs. I've also included the later project, The Garage Series, 1999-2001 as part of my Milwaukee "Place" projects because the garage images function for me as "character portraits" of Milwaukee as a place and the people who lived in it.
It may be most accurate to say that none of the projects on my Milwaukee "Place" list are about "Place" in the way that we usually think of the word, as associated with human settlements of a particular social character. If you read the introductory statements for each of the projects, you will see I had other ideas in mind. Alfred Stieglitz's (and Minor White's) poetic idea of the Equivalent had generally dominated my photography throughout my undergraduate and graduate years of photographic study (1964-68 and 1969-72).
As a graduate student at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque (1969-72) I became very involved with the ideas of depth psychologist Carl G. Jung. His research into the Creative Process as it related to Medieval Alchemy, and his ideas about the Self, the Symbol and Synchronicity expanded my understanding of Stieglitz's idea of the Equivalent. I devoted my MFA written thesis to Jung's ideas. (See: The Symbolic Photograph : A Means to Self-Knowledge.)
I read Barnett Newman by Thomas Hess in 1972, while still in graduate school; then I re-read in 1978. It was in the chapter entitled Onement that I re-discovered the Makom concept of "Place" that became a major turning point in my Creative Process. (Newman did a series of paintings entitled "Onement." At the end of this blog page I have reproduced the first painting in his series.)
The Steve Lacy Series, 1977-78 is included in my list of Milwaukee "Place" projects primarily because the subject matter I photographed (East Side street scenes, neighborhood front yards, back yards, alleys, etc.) related to Milwaukee as a Place. However "Place" in terms of Makom was not on my mind when I was working on that particular project; the music of Steve Lacy had inspired the photographs. I've also included the later project, The Garage Series, 1999-2001 as part of my Milwaukee "Place" projects because the garage images function for me as "character portraits" of Milwaukee as a place and the people who lived in it.
It may be most accurate to say that none of the projects on my Milwaukee "Place" list are about "Place" in the way that we usually think of the word, as associated with human settlements of a particular social character. If you read the introductory statements for each of the projects, you will see I had other ideas in mind. Alfred Stieglitz's (and Minor White's) poetic idea of the Equivalent had generally dominated my photography throughout my undergraduate and graduate years of photographic study (1964-68 and 1969-72).
As a graduate student at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque (1969-72) I became very involved with the ideas of depth psychologist Carl G. Jung. His research into the Creative Process as it related to Medieval Alchemy, and his ideas about the Self, the Symbol and Synchronicity expanded my understanding of Stieglitz's idea of the Equivalent. I devoted my MFA written thesis to Jung's ideas. (See: The Symbolic Photograph : A Means to Self-Knowledge.)
I read Barnett Newman by Thomas Hess in 1972, while still in graduate school; then I re-read in 1978. It was in the chapter entitled Onement that I re-discovered the Makom concept of "Place" that became a major turning point in my Creative Process. (Newman did a series of paintings entitled "Onement." At the end of this blog page I have reproduced the first painting in his series.)
*
Persephone, Queen of the Underworld
My first photography project completed in Milwaukee was not a Milwaukee "Place" project. The Persephone Series, 1975-76 was about a mythic "Place," the darkly lit and psychologically troubled interior "underworld" of Hades--the "land of the dead." This project is also the last in a series of Three Multiple-Exposure Related Projects.
The second project I completed in Milwaukee, The Steve Lacy Series, 1977-78 was only indirectly about Milwaukee. The work I did for the Steve Lacy Series got me out of Hades and into the crystalline light of Milwaukee's East Side, which is near the University and only six or so blocks from Lake Michigan. I was attracted to front and back yards and alleys. The work however was for me never about "place" in the Makom sense of the word. Rather the work had intuitively become a visual response to to music I had been listening to, the music of Steve Lacy.
The third photography project I completed in Milwaukee, the Negative Print Series : Memories of Childhood 1978-80 was the first project in which I consciously photographed with the Makom project in mind. The project was initiated by a synchronistic intersection of two important events: 1) my re-discovery of the concept of Makom in the Thomas Hess book, Barnett Newman; and 2) my discovery of an old box of snapshots in my mother's closet which contained images of my childhood backyard in Piqua, Ohio--images of laundry hanging on lines, flower gardens, a picture of me about to sit on "my" concrete block at the corner of our neighbor's garage which was atop a small earth mound.
The old snapshots I found were often overexposed, nearly all white, almost blindingly brilliant. They were for me transformative images of my childhood experiences of Place, and it was this idea that inspired the making of negative print images--internally luminous images which would become a metaphor (for me) of the way personal memories become transformed over time with something like a magical "psychic" luminosity. In my negative print imagery there is an emphasis on the inversion of shadow tonalities. That is to say, the shadow tones in the original photographic image become turned inside-out such that they become the "source" of light which illuminates the negative print as a whole, as if from within.
from the Memories of Childhood (Negative Print) Series 1978-80
It is in the last six of my Milwaukee projects (listed again, below) that "Place" is addressed simultaneously by the concept of Makom and by Milwaukee as a "Place" with its own unique personal character. The Negative Print Memories of Childhood project; the Lake Series, the Images of Eden [Milwaukee County Park Photographs] project; the City Places project; the Milwaukee River project; and finally the Garage project, are direct visual responses to Milwaukee "Places," even if their primary focus (for me) as a picture-maker was about Makom in the sense of: "The Place spoke to me . . . The Place where God is Present."
Extending the idea of Makom to "Things"
Around 1983-84 I read a book by Robert Bly entitled News of the Universe. His chapter about "object poems," or "thing poems" had a profound influence on me at that time. It was another one of those major turning points in my Creative Process. Essentially the idea is that the things of the world are alive with the same consciousness, and filled with the same divine presence as human beings. The Thing-Centered Photography Projects simply extend the idea of Makom from "space" and "place" to "things."
The idea began to unfold in the Family Life, 1985-88 project, and then it just flourished in the Studies projects, which includes The Garage Series 1999-2001, part of my collection of Milwaukee "Place" projects.
Makom, Time, Synchronicity & Grace
In Siddha Yoga the presence of God is understood to be all pervasive. The ancient text known as the Shiva Sutras state unequivocally: "there is nothing that is not Shiva" [God, the divine Self of all]. Everything in the universe, including Time is a created form of the divine Presence.
I have already mentioned (above) Carl Jung's theory of synchronicity which is an important aspect of my Creative Process that relates directly to Time. The theory addresses the acausal "falling together" in time (or the acausal, graceful intersection of time-space events) which one perceives to be not only personally meaningful but, more importantly, profoundly revelatory (often of unconscious or transcendent content). Synchronicity is essentially an experience of grace in which the perceiver and the perceived become One in the act of perception; in other words, "seeing with the Eye of the Heart," seeing with grace, is an experience of The Oneness of Being.
Just as a symbol in the Jungian sense is an image that conjoins corresponding inner and outer world counterparts into a single Imaginal Unitary Reality, so is synchronicity a perceptual revelation of the Oneness of Being. Barnett Newman's experience of standing before the sacred Indian Mounds and feeling his own sacred Presence (Here, I am . . .) is a perfect example of the experience of synchronicity, an experience of grace in which Newman perceived the sacredness of a Place in the physical world simultaneously deep within his own Self.
I had an experience at the Grand Canyon that relates to Barnett Newman's epiphany. See my blog essay: Seeing the Grand Canyon.
Another major influence for me was Gaston Bachelard's book The Poetics of Space. The entire book is remarkable, but I especially resonate to the chapters "Corners" and "Intimate Immensity." I will give you a few quotes from these two chapters, then close with a Siddha Yoga teaching.
In homage to Barnett Newman, I offer these words and his painting entitled Onement, I:
Here, I am
Here, in this Place
imbued with a sacred Presence
that is radiantly alive within me, as me
Related Project
The second project I completed in Milwaukee, The Steve Lacy Series, 1977-78 was only indirectly about Milwaukee. The work I did for the Steve Lacy Series got me out of Hades and into the crystalline light of Milwaukee's East Side, which is near the University and only six or so blocks from Lake Michigan. I was attracted to front and back yards and alleys. The work however was for me never about "place" in the Makom sense of the word. Rather the work had intuitively become a visual response to to music I had been listening to, the music of Steve Lacy.
(L) My dad and me, in front of hanging laundry (R) our backyard with hanging laundry.
(Note: the garage became a major theme in my work in the 2000. It started as part of my series of Studies projects, then later when I made a digital version of the project, the images expanded in scale and I suspended the garage images in black space with the music of (Note: the Garage project was also inspired by music, in this case music composed by the American composer Morton Feldman. Visit The Garage Series, 1999-2001)
The old snapshots I found were often overexposed, nearly all white, almost blindingly brilliant. They were for me transformative images of my childhood experiences of Place, and it was this idea that inspired the making of negative print images--internally luminous images which would become a metaphor (for me) of the way personal memories become transformed over time with something like a magical "psychic" luminosity. In my negative print imagery there is an emphasis on the inversion of shadow tonalities. That is to say, the shadow tones in the original photographic image become turned inside-out such that they become the "source" of light which illuminates the negative print as a whole, as if from within.
from the Memories of Childhood (Negative Print) Series 1978-80
The "interior" luminosity in the Negative Print Memories of Childhood photographs became a metaphor for the "transcendental" sense of Makom: "the 'Place' where God is present." The imagery is quite abstract, based mostly in my nostalgic remembrance of experiences of place related to my childhood. The project is an important body of work for me, the first which relates directly, consciously to the Makom concept, even though the images rarely if at all provide a literal description to Milwaukee places I photographed in the physical world.
Similarly, the 1980-81 Intimate Landscape photographs, which were made in Milwaukee's Industrial Valley, are about "place" in the Makom sense of the work. But the work does not provide a literal description of the Milwaukee places in which I photographed.
Similarly, the 1980-81 Intimate Landscape photographs, which were made in Milwaukee's Industrial Valley, are about "place" in the Makom sense of the work. But the work does not provide a literal description of the Milwaukee places in which I photographed.
*
It is in the last six of my Milwaukee projects (listed again, below) that "Place" is addressed simultaneously by the concept of Makom and by Milwaukee as a "Place" with its own unique personal character. The Negative Print Memories of Childhood project; the Lake Series, the Images of Eden [Milwaukee County Park Photographs] project; the City Places project; the Milwaukee River project; and finally the Garage project, are direct visual responses to Milwaukee "Places," even if their primary focus (for me) as a picture-maker was about Makom in the sense of: "The Place spoke to me . . . The Place where God is Present."
The Milwaukee Makom "Place"
Photography Projects
Photography Projects
Extending the idea of Makom to "Things"
Around 1983-84 I read a book by Robert Bly entitled News of the Universe. His chapter about "object poems," or "thing poems" had a profound influence on me at that time. It was another one of those major turning points in my Creative Process. Essentially the idea is that the things of the world are alive with the same consciousness, and filled with the same divine presence as human beings. The Thing-Centered Photography Projects simply extend the idea of Makom from "space" and "place" to "things."
The idea began to unfold in the Family Life, 1985-88 project, and then it just flourished in the Studies projects, which includes The Garage Series 1999-2001, part of my collection of Milwaukee "Place" projects.
Makom, Time, Synchronicity & Grace
In Siddha Yoga the presence of God is understood to be all pervasive. The ancient text known as the Shiva Sutras state unequivocally: "there is nothing that is not Shiva" [God, the divine Self of all]. Everything in the universe, including Time is a created form of the divine Presence.
I have already mentioned (above) Carl Jung's theory of synchronicity which is an important aspect of my Creative Process that relates directly to Time. The theory addresses the acausal "falling together" in time (or the acausal, graceful intersection of time-space events) which one perceives to be not only personally meaningful but, more importantly, profoundly revelatory (often of unconscious or transcendent content). Synchronicity is essentially an experience of grace in which the perceiver and the perceived become One in the act of perception; in other words, "seeing with the Eye of the Heart," seeing with grace, is an experience of The Oneness of Being.
Just as a symbol in the Jungian sense is an image that conjoins corresponding inner and outer world counterparts into a single Imaginal Unitary Reality, so is synchronicity a perceptual revelation of the Oneness of Being. Barnett Newman's experience of standing before the sacred Indian Mounds and feeling his own sacred Presence (Here, I am . . .) is a perfect example of the experience of synchronicity, an experience of grace in which Newman perceived the sacredness of a Place in the physical world simultaneously deep within his own Self.
I had an experience at the Grand Canyon that relates to Barnett Newman's epiphany. See my blog essay: Seeing the Grand Canyon.
________________________
Epilogue
I am the space where I am.
Noel Aranaud from L'etat d'ebauche
Every object invested with intimate space
becomes the center of all space.
Gaston Bachelard
In a study of of images of intimacy we shall pose the problem
of the poetics of the house. . . With the house image we are
in possession of a veritable principle of psychological
integration. . . . The house image would appear
to have become the topography of our intimate
being. . . . Our soul is an abode. . . . The
house images move in both directions:
they are in us as much as
we are are in them.
Gaston Bachelard, Introduction
*
In the Siddha Yoga teachings, there is a word darshan that means divine vision. The word could appropriately be applied to Barnett Newman's experience at the Indian Mounds of Ohio, my experience standing before the vastness of space of Lake Michigan, or the Grand Canyon, and my experience of Gurumayi's spiritual presence, her grace, when I first encountered her in a meditation program in 1987.
The word darshan can refer literally to seeing a saint or a deity, a sacred Icon, a Symbolic Photograph; it can also refer to an inner experience of one's own divinity, the Self of All, the Oneness of Being. Darshan is an experience of recognition of the divine Reality that exists beneath, behind, above, below, within and surrounding any and all of the things of outer world. Swami Muktananda writes in his book The Perfect Relationship:
The word darshan can refer literally to seeing a saint or a deity, a sacred Icon, a Symbolic Photograph; it can also refer to an inner experience of one's own divinity, the Self of All, the Oneness of Being. Darshan is an experience of recognition of the divine Reality that exists beneath, behind, above, below, within and surrounding any and all of the things of outer world. Swami Muktananda writes in his book The Perfect Relationship:
The place of recognition . . . the final stage of meditation . . .
is the goal of your [inner, yogic] search. When you reach
this place, the world will reveal its divine mystery
before your eyes. . . then you will remember
the Upanishadic mantra: "It is God who
pervades the form of the universe."
Swami Muktananda, The Perfect Relationship
In homage to Barnett Newman, I offer these words and his painting entitled Onement, I:
Here, I am
Here, in this Place
imbued with a sacred Presence
that is radiantly alive within me, as me
Barnett Newman, Onement 1 1948
oil on canvas and oil on masking tape on canvas
27" x 16" (click on image to enlarge)
This project was announced on my blog's
Welcome Page on November 15, 2019
and revised many times thereafter.
Final Edit: Mid & Late February, 2022
Seeing The Grand Canyon An essay about Perception & Projection by Steven Foster
Visit the Welcome Page to my Departing Landscape photography blog which includes the complete listing of my online photography projects dating back to the 1960's, my resume, contact information, and much much more.