“It is the unbound images of Painters including Picasso, Monet, Van Gogh, Georgia O’Keefe, Max Ernst, Rene Magritte, Remedios Varo, Jackson Pollack, Andrew Wyeth, Rotraut Moquay, Roberto Matta, and Kenji Yoshida that magnetize me to the visual arts and their purpose in human advancement. What they began to grasp of the context of existence beyond physical subjects and objects; what through impressionism, cubism, surrealism, and abstract impressionism began to challenge our preconceptions and conditioned thoughts about who we are; I would try to make more tangible in a photographic genre I termed “Convergent Reality”.
Photographers including Ansel Adams, Paul Strand, Lee Friedlander, Wynn Bullock, Minor White, and Paul Caponigro (especially the latter three) set a creative and quality standard for my work and laid the foundation for a life given to the challenge of interpreting, in photography, an existence which integrates the separate physical reality formed by our conditioned outer senses, and the luminous energetic network in which all are of one Consciousness and one Being.
My relationship to form is one akin to those Architects who demonstrate a reverence for the all-pervading elements of earth, water, light and air, and endeavor to create designs which do not compromise, but rather make both the physical and non-physical dimensions of a space more evident. Whose architectural forms are of the highest levels of harmony and functionality because they began with some level of inner atunement to the etheric atmosphere and intangible forces of a space. I resonate with Architects like Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Louis Kahn, and Peter Zumthor whose work demonstrates an adeptness for holding an essential perception of the multidimensional Whole, while integrating every visible and imperceptible and unyielding detail and transition in a way that enhances understanding of the Whole of which they are a part.
My conception of a cosmic current networked throughout all creation: dynamic lines of subtle energy increasingly condensed into forms perceived by the physical senses, and of a microcosm of this cosmic system of creation vibrating within every human is reflected in ancient mandalas of the Hindu and Buddhist traditions and the yantra energy patterns which I closely associate with.
How we sense will determine what we sense and is at the root of advancing both art and science, and our ability to make tangible and perceivable what is yet unperceivable in an increasingly refined and undistorted experience of our human potential. It is within the capacity and responsibility of both art and science to excel beyond every pre-conceived limit of mind and matter. The genre of photography I have termed “Convergent Reality” and its associated perception are the outcome of 25 years of fearless self- exploration applying the inner technologies taught to me directly by Yogi Bhajan, Guru Dev, and Shri Shyamji Bhatnagar, informed also by the writings of Sri Aurobindo, among other spiritual Teachers. I continue a life of learning with the view that even the most unlikely encounter may bring what is needed to expand my experience, and that the seed of cosmic intelligence or Source Consciousness is present in all of Nature. In its Infinite capacity, one never knows when it will blossom in our midst or in the depths of our own being. One can however grow the capacity to recognize its presence with greater frequency and stillness within and in all existence. In this way life becomes truly radiant and joy is the revelation of its Light even in the mundane and seemingly inanimate.”
–Deborah Goudreault