Chromatic Fields, Symmetrical Photographs & Recurrent Creation

 

Chromatic Fields 

Symmetrical Photographs

  &  Recurrent Creation . . .

 

Chromatic Field Photograph (Grid Garage Door & Gable)

Chromatic Field Photograph  (Cement Wall, broken symmetry)

Chromatic Field (Triangulated & Inversed Wall with Lines & Vines)

Chromatic Field (Bricks and Morter)

Chromatic Field (Luminous Clouds, Blue sky)

The changing processes of nature are viewed as permanent patterns

which through repetition integrates time and process 

into the image of eternity.

Seyyed Hossein Nasr

Only through rhythm is one able to escape the prison of time.

Nature is continual repetition, inspiring man to imitate her 

"in her mode of operation" through an open-ended,

continuous movement system.

Laleh Baktaiar  

   
Islamic art is predominantly a balance between pure geometric form and what 

can be called fundamental biomorphic form . . .  The one aspect reflects the

facets of a jewel, the purity of the snowflake . . .  / The other, the silent

motion of fish winding their way through the water, the unfolding 

and unfurling of the leaves of the vine and rose.  The Islamic  

art of geometric form can be considered the crystallization

stage both of the intelligence inherent in manifest form 

and as a moment of suspended animation of the effusion of content through form.

Keith Critchlow: Islamic Patterns: An Analytical and Cosmological Approach

All quotes are from my project 

Symmetrical Photograph (Snow)

Symmetrical Photograph (Rocks, Maine from the "Rock Flowers" project

Symmetrical Photograph (Marble column, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey

Symmetrical Photograph (Vermont Leaves) from the project Field of Vision)

Introduction

I enjoy looking into vast fields of space; and similarly I enjoy looking into vast fields of pictorial space.  The  Chromatic Field photographs I have made, inspired by the music of American composer Morton Feldman offer fascinating opportunities to satisfy this longing for such a visual experience, as do the Symmetrical photographs I have made which were inspired by my many experiences of Islamic Sacred Art which I encountered--in so many different, wonderful forms--during a tour of Turkey I took with my wife Gloria in the spring of 2011.    

The Chromatic Field photographs, and the Symmetrical photographs share two characteristics; both are constructed photographs, like an architectural facade, built brick by brick, placed one upon another . . . one next to another . . .   And the constructions consist of the repetition of the the same one image.  Feldman often repeated various sequences of notes, or melodic themes, and unexpectedly he would make you become aware of your expectations as a listener by changing the sequence of notes sometimes slightly, sometimes more dramatically.  He wrote a composition entitled Crippled Symmetry to make this point quite clear.

 Islamic Sacred Art repeats visual motifs infinitely to symbolize the eternal nature of the divine source that pervades everything and the space between them, and to visually affirm the Islamic concepts of Unity In Multiplicity . . . The Oneness of Being.

Henry Corbin writes about "Recurrent Creation": 

Imaginative vision becomes vision of the heart . . . the heart being the organ, the "eye" by which God sees Himself: the contemplant is the contemplated (my vision of Him is His vision of me).  In its ultimate degree, the Image will be a vision of the "Form of God" corresponding to the innermost being of the contemplant, who experiences himself as the microcosm of the Divine Being; a limited Form, like every form, but a Form which as such . . . emanates an aura, a "field" which is always open to "recurrent creations."  This presupposes of course a basic visionary Imagination, a "presence of the heart" in the intermediate world . . . an intermediate world which is the encounter (the "conspiration") of the spiritual and the physical . . . Henry Corbin: Alone with the Alone

*

Throughout my career I have repeated certain important images in multiple, different visual and conceptual contexts;  and I have often revised images, altering them in many ways, and by changing the visual or conceptual contexts in which they become seen.  I enjoy creating a body of work consisting of variations on the same one theme (for example a series of images of the same one kind of subject matter or place--the Meadow, the Lake, etc.).  I enjoy immersing myself in expansive fields of "abstract" shimmering, vibrating, luminously flickering visual energy.

 

Chromatic Field (Abstract Photograph)

The use of repeated imagery began (as far back as I can remember) with my 1968 senior project hand-bound book Kraus which was inspired by Wagner's use of leitmotif in his four-opera Ring cycle.  

When I worked six years on the 1994-2000 Studies project I made multiple prints of the same image using various printing techniques which transformed the image in varying degrees; and then I used many of the same miniature silver-gelatin print images in my Triadic Poems, then later I made more visual poems using digital technology and Photoshop software.  See examples of the digital versions here: Visual Poems.   I have made many variations on these poems using the same imagery and variations on their placement within the triadic format I was exploring, and varying the images as well.  

Feldman's use of repeated melodic phrases with variations inspired my Triadic Memories project which explores in multiple ways the repetition of the same one image within a single photograph. His music was inspired by the Turkish rugs he collected.  His fascination with the use of repeated visual motifs in the rugs, and what he called "crippled symmetry" in which a repeated pattern was either accidentally or intentionally varied in subtle or sometimes very obvious ways within a given rug pattern became integrated into his compositions which were very large in scale (piano solo compositions last an hour or longer, for example) just as some of the hand made Turkish rugs you can see in museums in Istanbul were enormous (perhaps thirty feet long and 20 feet wide!!).   

*  

In the year 2000, shortly after I started listening to the music of Morton Feldman, I initiated my miniature silver print project The Garage Series project.  Then in 2006 I revised the Garage Series project through the use of digital technology, which was inspired by my 2003-07 (very first) digital project Triadic Memories which was inspired by Feldman's music.  I purchased my first Epson printer (the 2200).  I scanned my black and white negative, and started making digital prints using Photoshop editing tools and to my surprise became infatuated with digital printing.  By 2005-06 I purchased the larger Epson 7600 printer.   

As my fascination with Feldman's music and digital printing merged into each other I decided I would "go to the source" of Feldman's inspiration (Turkey) to try to understand what so attractive to him.  In the Spring of 2011 my wife Gloria and I traveled to Turkey in search of the rugs that had inspired his music. 

The decision to travel to Turkey was also fueled by my love of the poetry of Rumi, the great 13th century Sufi poet-saint.  I had been drawn to his poetry (translated by Coleman Barks) long before I met Gurumayi Chidvilasananda in 1987 and began practicing Siddha Yoga.  However, after I began practicing Siddha Yoga I was delighted by the way Gurumayi often quoted Rumi's poems in her talks and writings, as did many of her swami's and devotees who wrote for the Siddha Yoga monthly publication Darshan. 

Rumi (1207-1273) had lived and died in Konya, now a part of Turkey, where today you can visit Rumi's shrine in which his tomb is displayed, along with many of his personal objects, such as the rugs he had used, manuscripts he had written.  Rumi had created a Sufi School, the Mevlevi Order in which he taught passionately about the use of music, poetry and dance (sama) as a spiritual path by which one can come closer to God, know one's own divinity, and ultimately to live in the unbroken awareness of tawid, The Oneness of God, the Oneness of Being.  The whirling form of dancing Sama, is usually performed while listening deeply, inwardly to Sufi music.  The whirling is essentially a form of continuously repeating spinning, on one foot, in a circular motion, over and over again which induces a trance-like meditative state of being in which the dancer loses his identity with his ego and becomes united with the divine Self. 

I have written about many of my experiences of Islamic Sacred Art in the first chapter of a major blog project I created upon my return from the tour of Turkey.  "An Imaginary Book" took me two years to complete.  It consist of many thematic chapters; you can visit the chapter Prayer Stones to read in details about my many experiences in Turkey.

*

This project, Chromatic Fields, Symmetrical Photographs & Recurrent Creation is based on several chapters of my "Imaginary Book":  The Light of Creation,   Ta'will,  Infinite beauty : Images of never-ending continuity . . .  and the Text Page for the Infinite Beauty Images Project.  I invite you to read the text for the two Infinite Beauty projects, and I have drawn quotes from those chapters in this abbreviated version of The Light of Creation which addresses the issue of Recurrent Creation which I believe explains why I am so fascinated by repeated imagery, re-vision, etc. 

The Light of Creation

 

 

The photograph above, created in January, 2013 along with five other similar images for The Light of Creation project were inspired by the writings of two Sufi saints, Ibn 'Arabi (1165-1240) and Najm Kobra  (ca. 1220), and the Hindu saint Utpaladeva (ca. AD 900-950).  Also very influential were: the writings of Tom Cheetham, and the Islamic scholars Henry Corbin, Seyyed Hossein Nasr and Samer Akkach; and the Hindu scholar Swami Shantananda, who introduced me to Utpaladeva's writings about how what we perceive to be "reality" is a continuing process of a flashing forth" and then dissolution of apparent reality.  

I had read Shantananda's book Splendor of Recognition many, many times but it was only after working on "An Imaginary Book" and reading the Sufic teachings about Recurrent Creation that I was reminded of some commentaries which Swami Shantanandsa (a Siddha Yoga teaching monk) had made on Utpaladeva's "theory of manifestation."  As you will see in the series of texts I have provided below, the Hindu theory involving the concepts Chiti, Spanda and Abhasa-Vada is very similar to the Islamic traditions, involving the concepts of The Breath of Divine Compassion, The Recurrence of Creation, and Perpetual Ta'wil.  

After I present the three texts, and some fascinating quotes by Henry Corbin and Tom Cheetham, I will then try to explain the relationships between Feldman's idea regarding what he termed the Chromatic Field, these "theories of manifestation" and  "dissolution" and my symmetrical photographs, which were inspired by the Islamic Sacred Art I saw and experienced in Turkey.  

*          *          *

The Breath of the Compassionate

The Recurrence of Creation 

Perpetual Ta'wil  

Ibn 'Arabi, the great Sufi mystic (which Henry Corbin writes about in great depth in his book Alone With the Alone) wrote compellingly about creation not only as an act in the past but also as a continuous process.  He termed the continuous process The Recurrence of Creation, and the concept relates to the Qur'anic phrase "Breath of the Compassionate."  Ibn 'Arabi says that with the inhalation and exhalation of the Divine Breath all cosmic forms contained in the Breath are constantly manifested and reabsorbed (dissolved), ceaselessly renewing the creation at every moment.

Seyyed Hossein Nasr, in his book The Garden of Truth wrote: “In the same way that each breath we take rejuvenates and makes possible the continuation of our life, the Divine Breath is renewed at every moment, making possible our and the cosmos’s continuous existence in what appears to us as duration.  This duration is, however, nothing but the repetition of the “now” within which creation is renewed.  In a deeper sense, every tree that we observe in the garden comes freshly from God’s creative act.”

Samer Akkach, in his book Cosmology and Architecture wrote: “In philosophical terms, the Divine Breath is the original medium through which potential beings were externalized, bursting out from the inwardness of formless potentiality into the outwardness of formal actuality.  It is the “substance of the world” wherein are latent all the possibilities of formal manifestation. . .   The Divine Breath is at once the creative medium and the necessary substantial support for all creations.”

Tom Cheetham, who had devoted four books to the ideas of Henry Corbin, explores this idea in his book The World Turned Inside Out: Henry Corbin and Islamic Mysticism.  He writes:  "The Creation itself as the realization of the Divine Compassion, the Breath of the Merciful, is itself the link between the human soul and the Divine.  And because of its living connection, it must be active, continually alive, subject to perpetual ta'wil.  This Creation is a recurrent Creation, not accomplished once and for all, such that we can at some time hope to know the ends of it . . . ”  

Cheetham continues: “This manifestation and annihilation occurs eternally, perpetually, instantaneously, and in all the hierarchy of worlds from the terrestrial upwards.  The interpenetration of this world and the other means that "this is the other world, or rather, this already is the other world."  This is the 'secret of Resurrection':  there is a 'continuous ascension of being [writes Henry Corbin]  . . . and their ascending never ceases because the divine descent into the various forms never ceases . . .  it exists in every moment.  It is the deepest purpose of human existence to journey from the outward to the inward and so “return creation to its origin."'”   [Note: Henry Corbin's words are from his book on Ibn 'Arabi,  Alone with the Alone, which was first published as Creative Imagination.  Visit this link The Divine Breath and Ibn 'Arabi's Cloud for further textual elaboration on this idea.]

*          *          *

The Mystic's Vision  (Corbin, referring to the "Field" and "Recurrent Creation")

Henry Corbin,  Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn 'Arabi

"Imaginative vision becomes vision of the heart . . . the heart being the organ, the "eye" by which God sees Himself: the contemplant is the contemplated (my vision of Him is His vision of me).  ~   [All that has proceeded] demonstrates the extraordinary role of the Image in the spirituality of Ibn 'Arabi.  In its ultimate degree, the Image will be a vision of the 'Form of God" corresponding to the innermost being of the mystic, who experiences himself as the microcosm of the Divine Being; a limited Form, like every form, but a Form which as such . . . emanates an aura, a "field" which is always open to "recurrent creations.'  This presupposes of course a basic visionary Imagination, a "presence of the heart" in the intermediate world . . . an intermediate world which is the encounter (the conjunction, the "conspiration") of the spiritual and the physical . . . "

*          *          *

“Flashing Forth” :  A Hindu Theory of Manifestation

Swami Shantananda, in his book Splendor of Recognition, includes a commentary on the Theory of Manifestation written by the Hindu sage Utpaladeva (ca. AD 900-950).  Utpaladeva postulates that everything we experience and perceive in life is a projection, a flashing forth of Reality. . .  He says that there is nothing in this universe but God; only our understanding makes us see things otherwise.  This “flashing forth” happens through what Utpaladeva terms abhasas: that which flashes, illumines, appears, or manifests.  Abhasa also means “splendor.”

Swami Shantananda writes: “By choosing the term abhasa Utpaladeva seems to emphasize two significant aspects of the creative act: on the one hand, that objective manifestations are forms of mahaprakasa, the great light of Consciousness which illumines; and on the other hand, that they are ephemeral flashes, mere projections onto the screen of Chiti [the creative power of universal Consciousness] with no permanent existence.  In spite of the flickering and precarious nature of abhasas, without them, there would be no world to perceive.” 

Swami Shantananda continues: “The quality of ‘hiddenness’ is a highly significant aspect of abhasa-vada.  One reason life seems so perplexing is that many abhasas are veiled or unobserved. . . we’re sending and receiving abhasas all the time, often without even knowing it. . . we are forever creating realities, and these realities have their own existence and their own effect, regardless of our awareness of what we’re doing.  In other words, the multiple layers of manifestation happen simultaneously, whether or not we’re conscious of them.”

“An abhasa can be [writes Shantananda] a solar system, a country, a hat, or it can be a molecule or a particle of energy.  Anything that streams out of the great light of Consciousness is an abhasa.  At the subtlest level, our bodies are nothing but shining particles of light, pure energy--and, according to Utpaladeva, each of these particles is an abhasa.”

Again, Swami Shantananda: “Abhasas flash forth . . . incessantly and at a fantastic speed. . . When I speak to someone for just a few moments, that person is created and destroyed millions of times right before my eyes.  The abhasas that compose his body, his voice, his feelings, his gestures are appearing and disappearing, vibrating beyond the reach of my senses.  Each pulsation of spanda [divine energy] creates, maintains, and destroys everything.  The reason I can identify the person who appears in one moment as the same person I was speaking with just a moment before is that these abhasas flash forth in a given pattern, re-creating the person’s form and once again animating it.  According to Utpaladeva, each moment of our perception is composed of a series of abhasas, pulsating with tiny consecutive modifications that give us the impression of movement. . .  [An example:] Although on the physical plane we are aware of the stability of the Great Pyramid, on the cosmic level this very structure has vanished and re-emerged billions upon trillions of times.  In this sense, even the oldest human construction is only a fleeting appearance, a thing without stability in the infinitude of Consciousness.”

*          *          *

The Divine Breath is the original medium through which  

potential beings were externalized, bursting out 

from the inwardness of formless potentiality 

into the outwardness of formal actuality.

Samer Akkach

*

Abhasas flash forth in a given pattern 

re-creating the  form.

  . . . appearing and disappearing . . . vibrating beyond  the

reach of my senses . . .  each pulsation of spanda

 [divine energy] creates, maintains, and

destroys everything. 

Swami Shantananda

*

Imaginative vision becomes vision of the heart . . . the heart

being the organ, the "eye" by which God sees Himself: 

the contemplant is the contemplated 

 (my vision of Him is His vision of me). 

It is the deepest purpose of human existence to  

journey from the outward to the inward 

and so return creation to its Origin.

  . . . a Form which as such . . . emanates an aura, a "field" 

which is always open to "recurrent creations." 

the intermediate world . . . [is where] the encounter 

(the conjunction, the "conspiration") [takes place between] 

the spiritual and the physical . . .   

Henry Corbin

*

In the same way that each breath we take rejuvenates 

  and makes possible the continuation of our life, the 

Divine Breath is renewed at every moment 

making possible our and the cosmos’s 

continuous existence.

Seyyed Hossein Nasr

*

This manifestation and annihilation occurs eternally, perpetually,

 instantaneously, and in all the hierarchy of the worlds.

There is a continuous ascension of being . . . 

and their ascending never ceases 

because the divine descent 

into the various forms 

never ceases . . .  

it exists 

in 

every 

moment. 

Tom Cheetham 
Henry Corbin

Before your face, there is another Face of light irradiating lights; 

while behind its diaphanous veil a sun becomes visible, 

seemingly animated by a movement to and fro.  

In reality this face is your own face and 

this sun is the sun of the Spirit.

Najm Kobra

Najm Kobra: “Sun of the Spirit”

Henry Corbin, in his book The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, introduces the ideas of the great Sufi mystic Najm Kobra (ca. 1220) who states that the object of the mystic's journey, or search is the Divine Light.  He says the seeker, himself is a particle of that light which he is seeking. 

As Najm Kobra’s “traveler” approaches the end of his inward journey, he comes upon a column of space which consists of the invisible black light of God.  Henry Corbin interprets this column as: "the Pole of the Orient of the North from which all created things originate."  As the seeker approaches the Pole he becomes absorbed into its black light.  Self returns to Self.  Light returns to Light.  

Najm Kobra wrote: “On the mystic journey . . . when you have risen up through the Seven Wells of Existence, the Heaven of the sovereign condition and its power are revealed to you.  Its atmosphere is . . . a vital light through which flow waves eternally in movement toward one another. . .  Before your face, there is another Face of Light irradiating lights; while behind its diaphanous veil a sun becomes visible, seemingly animated by a movement to and fro.  In reality this face is your own face and this sun is the sun of the Spirit . . ." 

*          *          *

Again, I ask: what is so attractive to me and my Creative Process about repeated imagery?  . . . about creating Variations on a particular photograph?  . . . about revising images, and even entire projects?   This tendency toward repetition--and transformation--can only be attributed to grace, some unknowable creative impulse that is beyond my understanding.  

In this regard, then, I will conclude this project with some excerpts from a collection of ancient yogic teachings called the Guru Gita (The Song of the Guru).  The translation is from the SYDA Foundation publication The Nectar of Chanting.  In Siddha Yoga, the yoga that I practice, the core teaching is that the Guru, God and the innermost divine Self are identical, one and the same, and dwells in everything . . . and most especially the Human Heart.   

[The Guru, God, the inner Self . . . ] is the eternal

witness of the drama of the rise and the 

dissolution of this universe.

[The Guru] is eternal, self-existent, self-luminous,

beyond perception, formless and without taint.

 

. . . without beginning or end; unchangeable;

unknowable; smaller than the smallest, 

greater than the greatest.

 *

This project was published and announced

 on my blog's Welcome Page August 8, 2023

 

Related Blog Photography Projects 

Chromatic Field photographs 

Symmetrical photographs 

The "Straight" Photograph & Constructing Symmetrical Photographs

"An Imaginary Book"

The Sacred Art Photography Projects

Collections of Theme-Related Photographs & Projects

The True, Living Symbol & The Symbolic Photograph 

Please visit the Welcome Page to my blog The Departing Landscape.  It includes the complete hyperlinked listing of my online photography projects dating from the most recent to those dating back to the 1960's.  You will also find on the Welcome Page my resume, contact information . . . and much more.