In William Blake’s Footsteps
Recently there was a gathering in London of members of the international Sahaja Yoga theatre company, known as the Theatre of Eternal Values (TEV). As next year is the 250th anniversary of the birth of William Blake, TEV’s next production will be a show based on his life and work.
On Friday a group from TEV went to the Clore Gallery, part of Tate Britain, where they were allowed to view, up close, around 30 original Blake drawings, paintings and engravings not currently shown to the general public. These included several of the Illustrations to Dante’s Divine Comedy, as well as versions of The Simoniac Pope, A Vision of the Last Judgement, Whirlwind of Lovers, The River of Life, The Four and Twenty Elders and many others.
The pictures were placed, unprotected, on stands where viewers could sit and get as close as they liked. The vibrations were astonishing, and to see these works in their original form, rather than reprinted in a book, was like being in Blake’s own presence. The drawings seemed so fresh and alive, that one could examine every intimate detail, imagining that his hands had made those impressions just moments before. The apparent ease of his complex artistry fills the heart with awe, and one goes immediately into meditation.
The group then went to the public areas where just a few more of Blake’s paintings were displayed, including Elohim Creating Adam, Newton and Nebuchadnezzar.
Before we went into the gallery, although there was no rain, several of us witnessed a tiny rainbow directly overhead, lining the clouds that were being illuminated by the afternoon sun. It is extremely unusual to see such a rainbow directly above. In one of Blake’s paintings, The Four and Twenty Elders, the exact same image of a tiny rainbow appears at the top of the painting.
The following day the group enjoyed a guided tour of many of the William Blake sites in Central London, seeing where he had lived and worked, where he had taken his birth and where he died. We felt a shower of vibrations throughout the day as we walked in Blake’s footsteps.
The afternoon concluded with a visit to Bunhill Fields Cemetery in City Road, where a headstone in the middle of a paved pathway reads, “NEARBY LIE THE REMAINS OF THE POET * PAINTER WILLIAM BLAKE”. This is the only memorial to him.
There we were met by Carol Garrido who was able to take us to the unmarked spot beneath a tree where Blake is actually buried. Despite efforts by scholars and others over the years, the exact site had never been discovered until Carol and her husband, Luis, set out to find it a couple of years ago.
Carol unfolded for the group the wonderful story. Carol and Luis discovered the spot purely through vibrations. “We were suddenly aware of a fragrance, as from flowers, but there was no source nearby that could explain it,” explained Carol. Afterwards they were able to prove the location of Blake’s grave historically through many months of painstaking research and detective work. The proof, which has been accepted officially by the Blake Society as well as by the Corporation of the City of London, confirmed exactly the spot where the vibrations had led them.
The aim is that by 28 November 2007, the 250th anniversary of William Blake’s birth, the grave itself should be marked with a proper memorial.
No tag for this post.
Add comment October 23rd, 2006
On 14 October 2006 the opening premiere of the movie about the life and work of Shri Mataji, “Freedom and Liberation”, took place in the ARRI movie theatre in Munich. Munich is an important film production point in Germany, and hosts more companies producing technical film equipment than Hollywood.
