Syllabus: Art as Psi: A Portal to the Mysterious, Mystical, Magical & Miraculous

Course Description

This 4 week course is designed for anyone who wishes to gain a deeper understanding of how Art has given us a series of clues about the Psi human experience. We will review critical artworks going back to ancient times and we will wander across the Art history timeline to present for illumination. Who were these renegade artists who saw the creative potential of expressing what Psi meant to them, and who tried to capture the miraculous and mystical through various art media and across various cultural contexts? We will explore how artists have used art to convey the extraordinary, the unimaginable...

As we critically examine various art and art forms, the biography of a few selected artists will be placed within the framework of their time and their own personal and societal/cultural expressions. This journey shall enable the course participants to gain a deeper appreciation of a more obscure artistic legacy that has been given to us over the millennia, and to develop the tools to understand Art's more profound impact on our understanding of Psi phenomena and, equally, the importance of the creative muses in the exploration of consciousness.

Course Outline

Week 1: Introduction and Overview

  • What is Art? What is Psi?
  • The Art History Timeline!
  • Psi through the Ages: Ancient Civilizations

Week 2: Types of Psi Phenomena in Art

  • The Art History Timeline continued:
    Classical, Medieval Civilizations
  • Art depicting:
    • hallucinations
    • lucid, precognitive dreams
    • OBEs
    • hauntings & apparitions
    • UFO & alien apparitions
  • NDEs & after life; past life phenomena; remote viewing & psychokinesis; anomalous healing; divination tools.

Week 3: Art as Spiritual Activity

  • The Art History Timeline continued:
    • Renaissance
    • Modern
    • Contemporary Civilizations
  • Varieties of Artistic Manifestations/Expressions:
    • Statues
    • Temples
    • Paintings
    • Amulets
    • Sigils
    • Tools
    • Music
    • Sacred Geometry
    • Dance, Poetry, etc...

Week 4: How Art Gives Us a Deeper Scientific Understanding of Psi

  • Continuation of varieties of Artistic Manifestations/Expressions: Statues, Temples, Paintings, Amulets, Sigils, Tools, Music, Sacred Geometry, Dance, Poetry, etc...
  • Selected artists and their work:
    • Hildegard of Bingen
    • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
    • Rudolf Steiner
    • Helma af Klint
    • Carl Jung
    • Ingo Swann
    • Wassily Kandinski
  • The role of the Creative for a better understanding of the Science of Psi.

Course Materials

Suggested Reading Materials

  • Goethe's Science of Living Form: the Artistic Stages by Nigel Hoffman
  • Concerning the Spiritual in Art by Wassily Kandinsky
  • Art as Spiritual Activity, Ed. by Michael Howard
  • Art as Seen in the Light of Mystery wisdom by Rudolf Steiner
  • The Art of the Occult by S. Elizabeth

Grading & Course Activities

Students taking this course for a letter grade will be evaluated using the following information.

Grading and Assessment

  1. Students will be expected to view the class broadcasts or the recordings of the classes each week.
  2. Discussion Participation (50 % of your grade)
    Engagement with weekly discussion in class and in the online forums as well as by posting responses to the posts of other students: 12.5% for each discussion question for the 4 weeks of the course (50%)
  3. Assessment (50% of your grade): Final Project (Description in Courseroom)

FINAL PROJECT- Complete a minimum 1000 word paper (with references)

Chose either 1. a specific period in art history ( as per the historical timeline presented in first class) or 2. a specific artist to demonstrate how the art has been used to communicate a “deeper” more “invisible” meaning which gives us clues to the mystical, magical, mysterious of the world of psi phenomena.

Provide minimum of 5 images, maximum of 20, all work must be referenced and artwork used identified by artist, year if known, title, & source.

Please send a 2-3 sentence proposal as to the topic you will chose for approval after the first class, email to cmc.toporow@gmail.com

The final project is due seven (7) days after the final class is taught, and should be emailed to the instructor.

SUGGESTED FINAL PROJECT IDEAS FOR ART AS PSI PORTAL TO THE MYSTERIOUS, MYSTICAL, MAGICAL & MIRACULOUS

 

Aboriginal Art

Alchemical Art

Icelandic Art Tradition

Brazilian Art

Eight Trigrams, Fúxī, & the Prior Heavens Art

Hallucinatory Art

Kabbalistic Art

Remote Viewing Art

Tarot Card Art, Origins & Permutations

Sacred Geometry Art

Voodoo Art

Jungian Art

African Traditional Art

Hermetic Art

Indian, SouthEastern Mystical Art

Russian Art

Ancient Divinatory Art

OBE and/or NDE Art

UFO &/or Alien Abduction Art (personal accounts)

Artists of your choice as related to their psychic experiences and Art

… etc., etc., etc... endless possibilities!