PAUL LAFFOLEY (b. 1935 Cambridge, MA. d. 2015 Boston)
The City Change Your Life
1962
Acrylic with hand applied vinyl letters on canvas
24 x 48 in. / 61 x 122 cm.
Symbol Evocation: An Occasion of Pre-Perception of a Future Event
(narrative from 2013) As I think back over the 51 years since I did this painting, I cannot actually reconstruct the moment in time when I was motivated to paint this, and with such prophetic specificity. I believe the subject refers to the terrorist attack by plane on the New York’s “World Trade Center” building: (The Twin Towers) on September 11, 2001. That day is when Muslims state that Jesus was born. That date makes more sense to me than December 25th, [a date that was adjusted to Pagan winter solstice festivals in order to draw more people into the fold of forming Christianity]. September 11th in the Middle East would have been rather warm at the 31 ½ st North Latitude in Bethlehem [Bayt Lahm], and a pregnant couple could have stayed in a barn very comfortably.
“Even though there’s plenty we don’t know about apparently anomalous
cognitive abilities, one thing seems clear. If they happen at all,
they happen outside conscious control. For people used to rational
meditation of experience, that can be a very frightening prescription.
It means living outside the rules we rely on to make much of life safe.
It means living in a world unconstrained by ordinary boundaries associated
with space, time, and individual identity.”
Dr. Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer
Extraordinary Knowing
New York: Bantam Books
c. 2007
