Healing Through Art

by Mirtala

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Editor's note
Mirtala has expressed a sincere desire that this material be received in the spirit in which it is being given: sharing her experiences as an artist in awe of the power of art, looking for possible answers to its mystery.

INDIVIDUATION

The "wounded healer" is someone who has overcome and healed his/her wounds and as a result has acquired freedom from victim consciousness and an inner power that only direct life experience can give. Gradually and organically, there emerges a deep understanding and resonance with those still grappling with their woundedness. This inner spontaneous empathy, when expressed through art, can resonate with and heal that part of observers seeking to return to wholeness.

At the same time, it seems that the works of art themselves begin to carry, emanate and transmit a numinous healing energy, being charged and encoded with the activated spiritual, mental and emotional energy of the artist.

During the many years of making sculptures, I gradually became aware of the alchemical transmutation which takes place in the process of "bringing spirit into matter." For this, in essence, is what the making of sculpture is: giving a piece of matter a life of its own, as it were, of charging it with meaning, emotion and spiritual content.

As I stepped back to look at this process, some answers began to come as a result of my direct involvement in it, rather than through a theoretical analysis or speculation.

When the energy of some profound life experience impacts and shifts the awareness of an artist, and a work of art is produced as a result, that artwork seems to have the power to affect the viewer. The work of art can create an analogous shift in the viewer's consciousness, and thus a "resonance healing" may occur.

INDIVIDUATION Earth from Space Photo NASA

It appears that a process similar to what science calls "entrainment" begins to take place. When a system comes into harmony within itself and becomes "coherent" or of a unified frequency, it becomes more powerful and gains the capacity to "entrain" or pull after itself another system, which is out of harmony or "out of phase." This may be analogous to a laser beam of one wavelength, that is more focused and therefore more powerful than incandescent light, which contains many different frequencies.

In some cases there may appear to be present additional energies of other-dimensional beings, sometimes perceived as angels, inspiring muses, or guiding spirits.

Perhaps this relates to the ancient tradition in India of invoking the "living murti's" or energies of divine beings into objects of worship. Some yogis and saints acquire the power and the ability to do this as a sacred ceremony to bring the beneficent energy of these beings into the environment.

Some episodes as illustration
There was an interesting synchronistic "coincidence", when three of my hospice-workers friends called me, within a very short time of each other, to urge me to use my art work for healing because of the effects my images had on their dying patients.  

	INTO LIGHT		One patient did not want to part with the image of FREEDOM FROM MATTER, while another made the transition with a smile on her face, her eyes riveted on INTO LIGHT.		FREEDOM FROM MATTER

 My third friend noticed that the sculpture THE ENCOUNTER had a very calming effect on her dying patients. This inspired her to write a poem for one of my greeting cards with this sculpture set against an ocean background. Later, this card and the poem turned out to be a helpful "consolation tool" for grieving relatives.

	Poem by Shirley Blue I am standing on the seashore The ship spreads her sails To the morning breeze and Starts for the ocean. I stand watching until she Fades on the horizon and Someone at my side says, "She is gone!" Gone where? The loss of sight is in me Not in her. Just at the moment when Someone says, "She is gone" There are others who are Watching her coming. Other voices take up the Glad short "Here she comes!"   And that is dying.		THE ENCOUNTER (greeting card)

These unexpected calls from my hospice friends made me stop and ponder on the healing effects of art. I remembered other occurrences where similar effects had been reported.

REGENERATION

In one instance, a couple became interested in my sculpture REGENERATION and took it home from the gallery on approval. Shortly after, the wife called the gallery asking for permission to keep the sculpture for an indefinite period of time, because her husband was suddenly taken ill. Even though they could no longer afford to buy the sculpture, they would like to have it around, because it was "like an icon, helping the husband to recover." They kept it for quite a while and returned it when the husband got well.

The interesting point about this story is that I made this sculpture after a serious illness of my own. On my first walk in early Spring, I came across an old willow tree stump, which was all hollow inside and looked quite dead. Coming closer, I was thrilled to discover tender green shoots coming out of the seemingly dead edge of the bark. I totally identified with it: "As long as the roots are alive, the tree is alive!." - The resulting sculpture REGENERATION was charged with the impact of this experience and thus could become the "icon" to the couple,
who could feel it through empathic resonance.

The following poem was also sparked by this experience:

Pull

the splinters

from the heart!

There will gush

streams

of sun

into

the freed

pulse -

let the splashes

fly

to the heavens!

In the ardent

seething

of the pulse

is a merging

of life

and the sun,

like a flame

splashes

the surge -

a resounding

summons

to joy!

Numinous healing energies in sacred art
The sacred images in temples, churches and shrines have not only the inspired energy of the artist, but also that of all the worshippers, who focus their highest thoughts and aspirations on them. The magnified energy radiated by these images is often healing and uplifting: "...peace that passes understanding."

After I began to mass produce this sculpture for stores and galleries, one of the store owners began telling me about the unusual effect it was having on some of her customers, who had no knowledge of the healing energy that it symbolizes. In most cases it was a spontaneous feeling of overwhelming unconditional love, bringing tears to their eyes and trembling of their hands while holding the statue. Rose Cote, the owner of a metaphysical store, has kindly written up some of these episodes:

When the Dhanvantri statue was first brought into my store a year ago, I held it in my hands and experienced the same sensation in my heart as I do when I send healing energy to patients. The statue felt as if it was alive. - That was the beginning of my journey with Dhanvantri, whom I had never heard of before.

I started loaning it to people and then it would pass from hands to hands, so that I wouldn't see it myself for long periods of time. I could tell you many stories but I'll limit it to just a few in this note.

A healer from India was in the store one night. I asked her to hold Dhanvantri. After a couple of minutes she said, "Take him. I'm going into laughter." After I took Dhanvantri, she went into a huge laughing spell, dancing around the room for several minutes.

My partner Paul told me that is one of the signs of the Dhanvantri spirit.

Another lady found tears streaming down her face while holding him. When the tears stopped, she looked at me and said that Dhanvantri had touched a place in her that had not been touched in a long time.

A different woman, who could not afford to buy the sculpture, repeatedly came to the store, just for the experience of holding it.

What is happening here? Why are people physically affected by an object?

Does this material representation serve as a focal point and a "conductor" for the emanation of this Being's energy?...

Incidentally, at present, a four- foot enlargement of Dhanvantri is being made for a Healing Center in Massachusetts.

Kirlian photography and healing art
Another example of the effects of a spiritual art object on the body came to me quite unexpectedly, when I went to see a researcher of Kirlian photography, Dr.Ara Avedissian. At the time he was exploring the correlation between the Kirlian auric patterns around fingertips and the corresponding organs and functions of the body. It so happened, that I had with me a new pendant I had just made, patterned after my sculpture THE ENCOUNTER.		THE ENCOUNTER (pendant)

These two photos were only an experiment indicative of the effects, which Dr.Avedissian continued to explore quite extensively. He can be contacted through IJHC.

Another bio-energy researcher, who experimented with a different pendant, PATH TO SELF, volunteered this comment:

	"I have been a bio-energy researcher and practitioner for 15 years. I wore the PATH TO SELF pendant over the thymus, during three days of inner reflection at a workshop. It magnified the release of energies, which blocked my heart and throat areas. Each release seemed to be magnetically drawn out of the body through the spiral." (M.D.M., Georgia)		PATH TO SELF ( pendant)

To research these fascinating effects and correlations would require a series of detailed studies. My hope is that some day we will have a collection of objective evidence demonstrating the effects of healing art on the body.  

Mirtala
 mirtala@earthlink.net

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