“It is the unbound images of Painters including Picasso, Monet, Van Gogh, Georgia O’Keefe, Dali, 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 hybrid medium of digital photography and perceptive sculpture and genre I termed “Convergent Realism”.
Photographers including Ansel Adams, Paul Strand, Lee Friedlander, Wynn Bullock, Minor White, Aaron Siskind, 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 material and the immaterial; the separate physical reality formed by our conditioned outer senses, and the luminous energetic network in which all is connected in one infinite Consciousness and multi-dimensional universe of Being. As my life evolved, I would discover my close alignment with those great Photographers who found their connection to Light through sound, and a preceding love and capacity for music or sound as word in poetry. Although an evolved relationship to Light is most often spoken of in the life and works of Adams, Bullock, White, Siskind and Caponigro, I identify with the varied degrees of sonoluminescent awareness that drove this lineage and empowered their creative vision and expression. Like Caponigro, even though serving the Light has become my dominant focus, subtle sound remains an integral part of refining my perception and experience of Light, Nature and our own human nature.
Having spent half my time at Columbia University at the School of Architecture and Planning, my relationship to form is closely 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. I am inspired by the high level of harmony and functionality in architectural forms when they begin 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 determines what we sense and is at the root of advancing both art and science. How much we realize of our unlimited human totality and capacity to excel in all fields of endeavor depends not only on expanding intellect and outer technologies, but on refining our perception beyond conditioned outer sensory experience, on our understanding of Light and its relationship to sound and evolving the mind's capacity, and our ability to operate without conflict in the context of our totality as well as our separateness. The responsibility of both art and science to transcend the bounds of every pre-conceived limit of mind and matter rests in those with the courage, consciousness, and inner sight to make tangible and perceivable an undistorted experience of what is yet imperceivable. It requires those who can perceive or calculate some dimension of the matrix which connects the finite to the Infinite and all existence to further unveil the subtle roots of Creation in both Nature and our own human nature. The genre of photography I have termed “Convergent Realism” seeks to challenge our conditioned reality with impressions of a more integrated multi-dimensional reality; where reverberations of Sound and Light are the subtle substance of our physical world and evolutes of the network through which it manifests. My unique perception has evolved over a lifetime of fearless self exploration, more consciously refined by 25 years practicing the inner technologies taught directly by Yogi Bhajan, Guru Dev, and Shri Shyamji Bhatnagar, and my interest in the writings of Sri Aurobindo. I continue a life of learning with the view that even the most unlikely encounter may bring what is needed to expand my experience of the absolute, and the seed of cosmic intelligence or Source Consciousness present in all 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 Nature. In this way life becomes truly radiant and joy is the revelation of its Light even in the mundane and seemingly inanimate.”
–Deborah Goudreault