ÉTUDES CIRCULAIRES

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a circular journey

In this print series I explored spiritual, philosophical and Zen related questions using the circle as a major symbol. Starting with Con-Zen-Trate (like most meditative processes do) this journey follows 21 steps, closing the circle with Nucleus.

All artworks have been created during the first Corona-Lock-Down 2020 … focusing on mainly digital processes, like vector drawings and photoshop collage, including painted fragments of previously created ink drawings.

Meditation (on circles): This series very much started like a meditative and intuitive process, open to see where this circular journey will lead me.

Most meditation practices start with some kind of concentration, breathing ore reciting techniques to center oneself. This is also true for Zazen, a seated meditation practice common in Zen Buddhism, whereby traditionally the eyelids are half-lowered, the eyes being neither fully open nor shut so that the practitioner is neither distracted by, nor turning away from, external stimuli. And it’s also true for Anapanasati, A Hindu-Buddhist technique focusing on on breathing. Practicing this technique shows the moment of pause – this silent break between breathing in and breathing out … sometimes it feels like there’s actually everything happening in this ‘inbetween’, in stillness … opening a door to a wider space.

Magnetic Fields: Duality is an entity of its own, actually a oneness, where a positive pole inevitable creates a negative one, actually needs a negative counterpart for its very existence and completion (and vice versa).

Inner Landscape: The horizon line in our inner world is separating our consciousness from the unconscious, where all kinds of known and unknown parts of our personality appear and disappear …

Openings: The journey through this philosophical series sooner or later inevitably leads to the question of truth and reality. Is it all about a universal truth or am I just interpreting my very own weltanschauung? I don’t know. Sometimes it feels like sneaking a peak through some openings in the blurred, illusory image we call reality (similar to the Hindu-Buddhist theory of Maya). On other occasions I’m just full of questions …

Liquid Silence: Silence is gold, they say – for me silence is liquid. It is a peaceful, calm and precious state, where one can feel the flow of time, energy, existence, … of Tao, if you want to name it.

Weigh On: The wheel of life spins round for man, you must adapt the best you can … No matter whether you seem to fit in or not, you do! We all do. There’s just one big entity.

Trace Through Time: Time’s only a linear thing because we perceive it that way, focusing on a specific trace (our life) in a timeless existence. It actually all happens at once, in one big, everlasting moment: Now.

Re-Flections (on circles): All that we see or seem – Is but a dream within a dream (Homage to Edgar Allan Poe) … so chasing rainbows is sometimes the only reasonable approach! … even our mind tends to run in circles … sometimes we just have to break the rule to get a new perspective.

Vanish Into Thin Air: Sooner or later we all disappear, it all will disappear someday, transient, impermanent, volatile … just vanish into thin air …

Overlapping Realities: Is our reality random and chaotic or organized and purposeful. Is it in the eye of the beholder or is the perspective depending upon the level of understanding?

Cosmic Views (on circles): I’m always fascinated how similar cosmic and cellular structures are. Are we looking at macro or micro cosmos? The Hermetic texts (and many traditions before and after I guess) proclaim: ‘As above, so below’, and I tend to agree.

Circles in circles within circles spinning around, orbiting … like a cosmic, circular spider web, everything is connected with each other. That’s how I see the principle of existence.

Side Note: I wrote an article about symbols based on circles and my view about this topic. If you’re interested in the magic of circles, give it a read!

Nucleus: This is the last piece of this series, interpreting the ever cycling wheel of life, spinning around a central point, the aim of all our journeys … In this sense the series ends where it all began, to start another round in this circular game.