I was recently researching the symbolic use of “light” in art and writing and came across this article, it had some really beautiful insights on the topic. The article focussed on its use in Jewish religious text. Some notes I took from it were:
- "Why has light been such a favorite symbol of God? Perhaps because light itself cannot be seen. We become aware of its presence when it enables us to see other things. Similarly, we cannot see God, but we become aware of God's presence when we see the beauty of the world, when we experience love and the goodness of our fellow human beings" (Eitz Hayim Commentary, p. 503).
- "A candle of God is the soul of man" (Proverbs 20:27)
- “In this wintry season of darkness, we recognize both God's role and our own human efforts in bringing light into the world.”
- Our lights(souls) can Enlighten & Enliven our surroundings
As I ruminated on the concept of our souls being a light, I felt like it directly related to a series I am working on called, “Women of Understanding”. The idea of this series to highlight female figures along with the wisdom/strength/power they carry. After reading this I thought, “what is brought into view from the “light" of the women I’m influenced by?” Some ideas were (including symbols I would use to represent then):
- Loving home
- Life - fruit trees
- Beauty
- Hope/peace…color green
- Science…some implement from astronomy…Telescope? Celestial map?
- Spiritual nature/strength...illustrate this through symbolic use of the color blue
- Healing
- power/strength...use wings…ancient iconography used wings as a symbol of both power and protection
- Perseverance - desert flower
- Industry - Beehive
I happened to pick up a lamp base at our trip to Bart’s and I thought what if instead of using it to emanate literal light, it could instead emanate symbols of the various things we are able to “see” because of the light the “Women of Understanding” themselves emanate?
This lamp would be made of the found base, cast paper flora, a cast paper celestial map, cast paper beehive, and fabric color elements.
In a dream world I would curate a show with this topic and invite a myriad of artists to contribute. I imagine the work ranging from 2-d, 3-d, and the written word. Potentially a lamp like the one I am making could tie all the different works together.
Some inspirational photos
The female astronomers' research at Harvard allowed us to map the sky and learn that the universe is ever expanding
Bees wings as a guide the casting
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