COMMUNION: ART as SACRAMENT.

Communion implies a process of communication. But the word is also about the sacramental in life. Communion reminds us of the importance of food, and how eating together was not just a matter of sustaining the body, but also of sustaining relationships, within the community, but also with the whole of nature. The Upanishads remind us that everything is in a sense food. At this time, when increasingly we are made aware of an ecological crisis which threatens to affect the very sources of food, and therefore of life, we see once more that eating is related to how we communicate not only with our own bodies, and those near to us, but also with the whole environment. One of the most important images of the future age in the Biblical tradition was the idea of the Feast, which is also a festival. Finally life is about celebration, of being filled, and fulfilled, and of sharing what we have with others. This then is also the most basic theme in art. Art should be a festival of life. It is a coming together in order to share life. That is why the last supper of Jesus has made such a powerful impression on the imagination of artists. In the Jewish, and also the whole Middle Eastern culture, eating is about sharing, about hospitality, and eating out of the same vessel. Jesus shared what he was eating literally with those who were at table with him. It was in a way a physical sharing, which crossed all boundaries; which made people of one body, and one heart. The figure of John leaning his head against the breast of Jesus during that last meal together, was the original symbol of the "Sacred Heart". Jesus washes the feet of his disciples, and that too is part of the shared meal, having a sacramental significance.

A COSMIC SIGN.

In the book of Revelations, we are given various cosmic signs. The human being receives Divine Portents, which show not only the future, but what it is to be human here and now. The artist, it is said, makes visible the invisible. Kabir speaks of the 'sign within the sign'. An important figure of the Book of Revelations, is the sign of a Woman who is in the Wilderness, and who is about to give birth. What is being symbolized is the immanence of a new heaven and a new earth. The function of art, both visual and also written or spoken, is to remind us of a world which exists in the human imagination. This world is in a sense a "Dream", but the dream finally is as real as the phenomenological world that we witness through our physical senses. Without the dream we would not be human, we would not be searching for something beyond what we presently experience through our bodily senses. Without the dream, humanity would be simply blind, having no inner spiritual vision.

THE SPIRITUAL WOUND.

The image of the Wound has played an important part in spiritual imagery. A liturgical Collect says "Grant, O Lord, that in your wounds we may find our safety." A hymn says "Hide me in your wounds". The artist Joseph Beuys used to say to his students: "Show me your wounds!" Here the wound is understood as a source of creativity, and a new vision of Reality. The mystic Kabir said that only those who are wounded by the Word, can understand the sufferings of others. One of the most moving images that many Christian artists have treated is that of the doubting Thomas who demanded to see the wounds of the Risen Christ, before he would believe. In my painting of this theme I have represented Thomas as a high caste believer looking at the wounds of a tribal or Adivasi Jesus. The image of the parable of the son who returns to his Father and Brother after repenting a dissolute life, has fascinated many artists. Rembrandt's last masterpiece which is now on view in Russia, shows the return of the son, embraced by his Father. It has been suggested that the youth who is returning is a self portrait, as also is the figure of the old Father who receives the son with love and compassion. In a strange way the figure of the son who comes back represents an essential element of the human condition, and is not just a sign of misery and defeat, but also of a transformation which reveals what is most precious in the heart of humanity, and what is most creative in human relationships.

A BURNING MADONNA.

There has been a long tradition in Christian art of the "Black Madonna". All along the pilgrim route to Santiago de Compostela, we find shrines dedicated to the Black Madonna. There are many theories concerning why she is black. The Black Madonna of Czestochowa, Queen of Poland, is not only represented as dark, but also scarred. On her cheeks we can see the wounds created by three slashes, thought by some to have been inflicted later on this icon supposedly painted by St. Luke. This figure of the dark Madonna is evoked in times of suffering. She is the guardian of the pilgrim who has to face many difficulties on the way. The Indian artist Frank Wesley often represented Mary as a dark featured Dalit or Adivasi woman. She is somehow a primordial feminine figure from which human culture as we know it emerged. She is like the dark earth, out of which the seed of human consciousness is born. Through her suffering she can identify with the suffering of her son, but also the suffering of all human beings. In the Gospel of Luke, the Prophet Simeon says to Mary: "This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed, so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed; and a sword will pierce your own heart too!"

TRANSFORMING FIRE

Fire has played a very important part in all religious imagery. In India Agni, the god of Fire, is also described as the Priest of the Word, and a third of the hymns of the Rig Veda are dedicated to this deity. Perhaps the central mystical experience that lies at the very heart of the Abrahamic Faiths, concerns the vision of Moses as a young shepherd, seeing the Burning Bush in the desert. The Indian mystic and seer Sri Ramana Maharshi also speaks of this encounter of Moses with the ultimate meaning of the universe. He points out that what Moses discovers in the wilderness is a God whose name was "I AM who AM". Ultimately this God is beyond name and form, and yet it is a power (in Hebrew it is called the Shekinah, which psychologist Carl Jung also relates to the Indian concept of Shakti) which transforms without consuming or burning to ashes. Thus there is a vast literature of Biblical interpretation called Midrash, which concerns the inner significance of this burning bush, which according to the narrative, was just an ordinary thorn bush; something quite useless and fruitless in the desert, in which the Divine Presence was manifested to the prophet Moses. There is a saying of the artist Michaelangelo to the effect that underlying all forms are the fiery shapes of flames. In Christian iconography the Burning Bush is related to Mary, in whose womb the Word of God was conceived. But this flaming tree also challenges human war and hatred, symbolized by a road of sculls, and the figure of the Hero who is a fighter. There are many myths which assert that ultimately it is the flames of sacrifice which create the universe. These flames could be related to the Golden Egg, at whose centre there is a heat that incubates life.

REPRESENTING SUFFERING

Traditionally Indian spiritual art has avoided representing suffering. Though the mood of suffering (Dukha or Shokha) has been a concern of all profound reflections on the human condition, the tendency of the Vedanta, and later Buddhist thought, has been to see this suffering as the result of ignorance, and reality as perceived through our condition within Maya, or the world of illusion. As art is supposed to aspire towards the Real beyond illusion, it has been thought improper to represent suffering, along with other forms of distortion or degradation. Ultimately art should point to that which lies beyond the passing and illusory. However, there has also been what we might term a counter-cultural stream in Indian iconography which has recognized that darkness, and the negative aspects of experience, do carry a significance that reveals a process of transformation. Kali, the dark and terrifying image of destruction, is an example of this other aspect of the Indian religious imagination. At the beginning of the Ramayana we are reminded that out of Sokha, or suffering, comes Slokha, or poetic utterance. The cry of the poet recognizing the finite, and passing aspect of existence; its transitoriness, and constant dependence on the processes of change, lead to a deeper recognition of how suffering is also an aspect of our passage through time. The Indian artist Frank Wesley, who very much influenced my art, often represented this dark image of suffering against the red background which we find in many Indian images. In the picture represented above of Cain slaying Abel, the red background shows both suffering but also an aspect of the Eternal which lies like a mystery behind the dark veil of human travail. Images of the body like the seed that falls to the ground, or the broken vessel of clay, are signs both of the human condition of suffering, but also a hope that lies beyond that suffering, pointing to a fire that also transforms.

ELEMENTAL SYMBOL OF LIFE

Basic forms which we find in nature, like the form of the seed, or the leaf, or the egg, can become potent metaphors for life. These shapes that are organic, relate also to the forms that we see in the human body. So the branch of an olive tree can be also seen as an image of the Mother and child. The abstract letter like the Sanskrit figure of the sound AUM, can be seen as representing the shape of a bird in flight. All abstract patterns interlink to give rise to a symbolic language. Every visual sign can become meaningful, evoking a spiritual reality behind external forms in nature.