Paul Laffoley Cambridge, MA, 1935-2015
The Visionary Point, 1970
Oil, acrylic, ink, and hand applied letters on canvas
73 1/2 x 73 1/2 in.
Subject_ The connection between that which has no history and that, which has only history. Symbol Evocation_ The Instant of Revelation. Comments_ The dream state being referred to is the...
Subject_ The connection between that which has no history and that, which has only history.
Symbol Evocation_ The Instant of Revelation.
Comments_
The dream state being referred to is the lucid dream brought to such a primordial and tupiodal (manifesting) state that we are placed in a position to witness universal creation and destruction directly. In the 18th century the German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) took Plato’s ideas of time and space and placed them on the same footing or ontic status. To the raw data of sensation, Kant held that we contribute the forms of space and time. Space is the form of the external sense, and time is the form of the internal sense. We never experience anything, said Kant, except that it is in space and time.
Yet we never experience either space or time. Space and time in which we order phenomena, therefore, must come not from sensation but from within. We are literal co-creators of the universe utilizing this capacity for revelation. I suspect that lucid dreaming or its variations is involved in how the copies are made from the platonic forms, thus explaining how becoming unites with being.
The Visionary Point, therefore, is that moment in time when a viable time machine begins to operate and has the capacity to access the entire past and future of human history from that fatal present. It is an instant of time that can be described as the meeting of time moving forward and time moving backward, and it becomes the point in time, which exactly precedes the beginning moment of the mystical experience of the entire earth.
Symbol Evocation_ The Instant of Revelation.
Comments_
The dream state being referred to is the lucid dream brought to such a primordial and tupiodal (manifesting) state that we are placed in a position to witness universal creation and destruction directly. In the 18th century the German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) took Plato’s ideas of time and space and placed them on the same footing or ontic status. To the raw data of sensation, Kant held that we contribute the forms of space and time. Space is the form of the external sense, and time is the form of the internal sense. We never experience anything, said Kant, except that it is in space and time.
Yet we never experience either space or time. Space and time in which we order phenomena, therefore, must come not from sensation but from within. We are literal co-creators of the universe utilizing this capacity for revelation. I suspect that lucid dreaming or its variations is involved in how the copies are made from the platonic forms, thus explaining how becoming unites with being.
The Visionary Point, therefore, is that moment in time when a viable time machine begins to operate and has the capacity to access the entire past and future of human history from that fatal present. It is an instant of time that can be described as the meeting of time moving forward and time moving backward, and it becomes the point in time, which exactly precedes the beginning moment of the mystical experience of the entire earth.
Exhibitions
Paul Laffoley_ Secret Universe 2. Nationalgalerie im Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin, 2011The Force Structure of the Mystical Experience. New York_ Kent Fine Art. September 11 – November 7, 2015
As Above, So Below_ Portals, Visions, Spirits & Mystics curated by Rachel Thomas. Dublin_ the Irish Museum of Modern Art. April 13 – 27 August, 2017
Paul Laffoley. New York_ Francis Naumann Fine Art. March 2 – April 13, 2018. (folio with text)
Visionary New England curated by Sarah Montross. Lincoln_ deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum. Oct 8, 2020 thru March 14, 2021.
Literature
Kittelman, Udo, and Claudia Dichter, eds. Paul Laffoley_ Secret Universe 2. Exhibition Catalogue. Berlin_ Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin; Cologne_ Walter König, 2011, pp. 134–135, ill. p. 71 (color)Walla, Douglas and Paul Laffoley. The Force Structure of the Mystical Experience. New York_ Kent Fine Art 2015, illus
Walla, Douglas, Linda Dalywimple Henderson, Steve Moscowitz, and Ariel Saiber. The Essential Paul Laffoley. Chicago_ University of Chicago Press, 2015. illus in color plate 26
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