Art and Consciousness Series - The Transformative Power of Appreciating Great Art

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"An average human looks without seeing, listens without hearing, touches without feeling, eats without tasting, moves without physical awareness, inhales without awareness of odour or fragrance, and talks without thinking" Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci's words strike an even deeper and more relevant chord with us today than perhaps they did 500 years ago. He describes the human condition, disconnected from the senses and experience and missing the subtlety behind physical phenomena. In our modern times the need for control over the natural world is damaging our inherent relationships with it.

Deep observation and appreciation of art has recently been cited by modern neuroscience as one of the most effective ways of increasing emotional and mental wellbeing, increasing creativity and inspiration, transforming consciousness and therefore effectively changing our world for the better.

Immersing yourself in the works of art, architecture and artists you find the most inspiring provides rich nourishment for the senses, the mind, the soul, the heart. Yet this is not new knowledge. For millennia people were aware of the power of art and images to convey hidden meaning difficult to express in words.

Taking the Florentine Renaissance as our lead, we will discover that the art and consciousness at this time was founded on a recognition of all levels of existence, of the cosmological order of harmony and proportion and of a deep appreciation of the human experience, creativity and relationships to nature.

In this workshop you will get the opportunity to explore your responses to art and discover how those responses are the keys to re-establishing lost wisdom, insight and a broader knowing. When we awaken the quality of our attention, our consciousness, to really see art rather than just look at it, we can transform that which we see, altering the world in which we live.

• Experience art as both a threshold and a doorway itself into deeper ways of knowing where you become the active seer.
• Discover works of art which hold deep, sacred and hidden meaning which can guide, teach, transform and heal.
• Awaken your senses, experience and responses, freeing blocked creativity and deepening intuition.
• Transform the personal into a broader understanding established in myth, archetype and the symbolic.
• Discover the power of the imagination to deepen relationships to the physical, living earth as well as the cosmological.
• Re-engage with forgotten ancient frameworks for knowing and understanding, including theory, reflective writing, meditation and discussion.