Following our popular session on Botticelli’s Primavera, we are offering an in-depth contemplation of its sister painting, The Birth of Venus. We will study the mythology and cosmology behind this iconic image, and consider it in the context of the revival of the divine feminine in Renaissance Florence.
In this seminar, we explore the 18th century German poet and scientist, Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe’s (1749-1832) relational approach to learning about the world; particularly engaging with the imagination.
Shakespeare’s ‘mirror up to nature’ encompasses every aspect of human being. It is common to explore his texts in terms of plot development, themes, imagery, historical background, sources/influences, rhetorical devices, linguistic analysis etc. This all has its place. But Shakespeare’s mirror up to nature goes deep. Deeper than perhaps any other writer has ever achieved. In this session, we will explore the different levels of meaning contained in these works and their power to transform our own understanding of ourselves and the world.
As Iain McGilchrist states in his book The Master and His Emissary, “The model we choose to understand something determines what we find….Our first leap determines where we land” (2012, p.97). Expanding our enquiry deeper into the imaginal realms, in this session we continue to take the imagination seriously and move into our heart space; known through various discourses as an organ of imaginal perception.
This talk was recorded on 27th April 2021. In this session, Dr Vernon reflects on the Divine Comedy and the great art it has inspired. It considers themes from the links between descent and ascent, the nature of freedom, the intelligence of light, and the transformation Dante himself undergoes that widens his perception.
In this talk, Dr. Rigoglioso calls upon one of the Virgin Mary’s forgotten gospels, the Infancy Gospel of James, to reveal a truth that has been suppressed for nearly two millennia: that Mother Mary was not a passive bystander to her own pregnancy but an advanced member of a sacred order of women trained in divine conception.
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