Aspect of Unreality

"From the mast-head the mirage is continually giving us false alarms. Everything wears an aspect of unreality. Icebergs hang upside down in the sky; the land appears as layers of silvery or golden cloud. Cloud-banks look like land, icebergs masquerade as islands or nunataks, and the distant barrier to the south is thrown into view, although it really is outside our range of vision. Worst of all is the deceptive appearance of open water, caused by the refraction of distant water, or by the sun shining at an angle on a field of smooth snow or the face of ice-cliffs below the horizon."

- Sir Ernest Shackleton (1874 - 1922)
South! (from Captain's log of "Endurance")

Imagery

"There is at the back of every artist’s mind something like a pattern and a type of architecture. The original quality in any man of imagination is imagery. It is a thing like the landscape of his dreams; the sort of world he would like to make or in which he would like to wander, the strange flora and fauna, his own secret planet, the sort of thing he likes to think about. This general atmosphere, and pattern or a structure of growth, governs all his creations, however varied."

- G.K. Chesterton (1874 - 1936)

The Invisible

"We are more closely connected

to the invisible

than to the visible."

- Novalis (1772 - 1801)

Organization of Energy

"Science shows us that the

visible world is neither 

matter nor spirit;

the visible world is the invisible 

organization of energy."

- Heinz Pagels (1939-1988)

Hidden Laws

"We should not see beyond nature. Rather, we should, so to speak, see through nature. We should see more deeply, see abstractly, and above all universally... The laws that have come to define the artistic culture are the great hidden laws of nature which art stipulates in its own way. It should be emphasized that these laws are more or less hidden behind the superficial aspect of nature, hence abstract art is opposed to the natural representation of things, although it is not opposed to nature, as most people think. It is opposed to man's brutish, primitive, animal nature, yet it is synonymous with the true nature of humanity."

- Piet Mondrian (1872 - 1944)

Let the Waters Settle

"Let the waters settle

and you will see the moon

and the stars mirrored

in your own being."

- Jalaluddin Rumi (1207 - 1273)

Spirit

"It is not always needful
for truth to take a definite shape;
it is enough if it hovers about us
like a spirit and produces harmony;
if it is wafted through the air
like the sound of a bell,

grave and kindly."

- Johann Wolgang von Goethe (1749 - 1832)

Goethe on Science

Stillness

"Be still.

Stillness reveals the

secrets of eternity."

- Lao Tzu