Aries - The Impulse of the Divine Will
18 December 2023, pencils and photo work
The fire sign Aries is associated with the energies of Will. The Aries glyph symbolises the strength and power of Aries just like the ram it represents. Aries is the impulse or birthplace of true ideas that unfold into activity. In Vedic wisdom, Rudra is the lord of Will and Fire. It is the Will that leads creation from seeming nothingness to manifestation. Rudra is usually referred to as Shiva and on the supra-cosmic level as Agni, the deva of fire. Shiva means the auspicious one who bestows bliss.
Rudra is peaceful, blissful and embodies calmness. People with a calm, balanced attitude can express power in a much stronger way than the seemingly powerful. The Will both builds as well as destroys. With the power of will and the appropriate fire, the Lord can remove obstacles such as pride and egoism of the personality and thus bring out the hidden light of the soul.
The colour of Rudra is pure red, which represents Divine Will. The will of Rudra can be invoked by meditating on the red colour of the sky during the morning hours. However, only advanced students can work with red; all others are advised to contemplate the softer colour variations of orange or pink.
The image is an expression of the energies of will with the hues of fire. From beyond the upper edge of the picture and from higher circles, the impulse precipitates down and appears in the form of the Aries glyph. From there, a fiery stream flows downwards.
The head in the centre of the picture was created using a photo of a Shiva statue. The statue shows an inward-facing expression with a peaceful, blissful smile. I surrounded the head with blazing fire, through which a leaping ram is rushing forth. The image of the ram comes from a fresco in the Palazzo Schifanoia in Ferrara, Italy, created by Francesco del Cossa between 1468 and 1470. It has been digitally restored and integrated into the flaming tones of the painting.
Aries - The Inner Path to Shambhala
19 December 2022, pencils and photo work
Shambala is the highest centre of enlightenment on earth. It is the seat of Sanat Kumara, the Lord of the Planet, and he presides over the evolution of planetary beings. Shambala is also called the thousand-petalled lotus of the earth and it has its counterpart in us as our thousand-petalled lotus, the Sahasrara or crown centre.
The inner path to Shambala is to visualise Shambala and connect with the lotus in the Sahasrara in our daily prayers. In doing so, we align ourselves with the super-self within us and link to the sound OM. Remembering Shambala daily strengthens our will to do good; our knowledge unfolds and our actions become more effective. Our will begins to change in a positive way. We become a citizen of the world in the true sense of the word.
For the design of the painting, I placed two flight photos of the Alps and the Himalayas in the background. I designed the silhouette of the meditator based on a picture of Master MN. For the design of the inner path to Shambala, I reworked elements that I had already used in earlier pictures.
Aries - The Three Great Fires and the Serpent of Eternity
8 January 2022, pencils and photo work
In the scriptures, creation is described as an expression of the first, second and third logos, or three fires coming from one source. We can consider these three fires as will, love and wisdom and intelligent activity. They are the cosmic or electric fire, the solar fire and the fire by friction, the invisible fire in matter.
These three fires are associated with the three fire signs of the zodiac, Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius. Aries represents the electric fire; Leo represents the transforming fire, and Sagittarius is the fire by friction. Even though we describe them as three qualities, the three fires are only one fire called "Agni".
From this source, the stardust comes forth as a ray of fire known as the great serpent Ananta, the cosmic Kundalini or the serpent of eternity. The stardust forms into stars or solar systems. This process is symbolically represented in the picture.
From the unity in the centre emerges the three points symbolizing the three logoi or the three fires. The fire pervades the space in which the serpent of eternity becomes visible. It is surrounded by the stardust from which suns and galaxies are formed. For the design of the stardust, I transformed a NASA/Hubble photo of a ring galaxy. The serpent of eternity and the fire at the background were generated with elements from different images.
Aries – The Midheaven Sun Alignment
28 December 2020, pencils and photo work
In Aries the Sun is exalted. Aries represents the midheaven and the midday where the Sun gives the brightest light. Aries is considered the head of the sun signs and also Aries represents the actual head of man. The highest solar centre in man is the Sahasrara, the head centre. When we stand vertically on the Earth, our head aligns with the midheaven. When the Sun is at the midheaven at noon, we can line up with the Sun. In this way we can align with the light in our head and connect with the greater centre of the Sun. This helps to rise from personality to soul consciousness and connect with divine consciousness.
The picture shows a group of people gathering at spring equinox and aligning and connecting to the higher energies. The circles around the Sun indicate the three planes of the Sun, the physical plane, the soul plane and the spiritual plane.
The colour of Aries is red. The shades of red along the central axis outline the figure of the solar angel through whom the energy pours down. The arced horizon line was designed with a photo of the Bernese Alps as an expression of the inner striving upward. At the top right you can see the Aries constellation and Mars, the ruler of the sign, and its glyph is at the top left.
Aries - Sun cuts the Equator of Mother Earth
1 December 2019, pencils and photo work
On his seeming journey from south to north, the Sun cuts the equator at spring equinox. It is the beginning of Aries and the Sun is directly overhead at the equator. The equator is an imaginary circle around the earth. South of the equator is the tropic of Capricorn and north of the equator is the tropic of Cancer; at both of these points the Sun seemingly changes direction. In Spiritual Astrology, cutting the circle is seen as the beginning of a new cycle.
The image visualises the Sun cutting the equator from an inner perspective. Inwardly, the equator corresponds to the navel centre. The picture shows Mother Earth sitting inside the globe and the Sun at her navel cuts the plane of the equator. Above and below are the two tropics. At her heart there is the shape of India and the Himalayas as her breast jewel. The North Pole is at the top of her head.
For the Mother Earth I used a statue of Quan Yin. The globe lies in a huge lotus, signifying the principle of unfoldment. The detail of the globe is created with the help of a picture from WorldWind.earth using NASA images. The reddish colour is from the overlay of a photo of a sunrise over India at a Christmas morning. The red Capricornian sunrays are seen as the blood of the Sun, the saviour.
In the upper left corner, you see Mars, the ruler of Aries, and in the right corner there is the constellation Aries.
Aries – Spring-up of Awareness
19 January 2019, pencils and photo work
The solar year commences from 0 degrees in Aries bringing the seeds of a new cycle. From out of the background of eternity, a new aspect of awareness comes forth. It descends as the annual impulse from higher circles to our planet to contribute to the evolution of the planet and the planetary beings. The impulse is symbolised by the glyph of the sign, the head of a ram. It represents the power to remove obstacles and to re-adjust the form into better and more advanced states.
I visualised this impulse by fusing two photos of a sunrise taken from an airplane. The glyph of Aries pushes forth from the bottom of the image. I depicted the annual cycle with a circle and the sunrise in its centre. The constellation of Aries is seen behind the sun.
Aries – Planet Blossom
23 November 2017, pencils and photo work
The visible planets are the physical bodies of great conscious entities expressing themselves through these forms. Just as we have incarnated into our bodies to grow and to make experiences, these sublime beings also live in their planetary globes to undergo their evolution on a cosmic scale. All the stars in the sky are at various stages of evolution. There are planetary entities higher than our planet, and there are suns higher than our sun. Like a flower that grows and unfolds to bring forth seeds for future flowers, our planet also unfolds like a beautiful flower, preparing future stages of evolutionary growth.
I visualised the earth inside the petals of a huge flower. For this, I worked on a photo of a Brahma Kamala flower (Saussurea obvallata, transformed from a Wikimedia photo by Sujay25), making it glow like a lantern. I created the starry background with the help of the beautiful Stellarium software. The stars are like fireflies blinking in the darkness of a magical garden.
Aries - Permeation
12 December 2016, pencils and photo work
The ancient Vedic seers described profound wisdom with the help of symbols. They saw the manifestation of a new creation as coming out of a Golden Egg and permeating the different dimensions of space. They visualised the beginning of a new cycle with the story of how the head of the proud Daksha was cut and replaced by the head of a ram, the symbol of Aries, the power of stepping forth and penetrating. They further took the horse as a symbol for the life force and they saw Aries as the head of the horse. The sunrays, the transmitter of life force, are called horses and the seven rays are seen as seven horses drawing the chariot of the sun. The sunrays are understood as permeating space, being at the same time present in the Sun, on Earth and in between.
The image slowly developed while meditating on these symbols and qualities for several days. I took the ram head from the photo of a fountain in the old city of Berne. I placed it into a circle of twelve suns and created a sphere with the seven spectral colours on a starry background of space. In the middle of the circle I placed an egg-shaped form out of which light permeates – a symbol for the Primordial Deep, Aditi, the Mother, which gives birth to the devas, beginning with the Sun-god.
At the lower part of the image I created a fiery sphere around the Sun and I placed seven white horseheads and I added to their heads flames in the colours of the seven rays. I created the horseheads with the help of a Wikipedia photo by “Aleph” showing the Brandenburg Gate Quadriga in Berlin at night.
Aries –The Three Great Fires and the Cosmic Kundalini
16 December 2015, pencils and photo work
The three fiery signs of the zodiac – Aries, Leo and Sagittarius – are described as three fires. The cosmic or electric fire is the spirit, the pure energy. It expresses through the solar fire, the energy of the soul, and then through the terrestrial fire by friction or the visible expression of the energy. Before the energy consolidates into the star dust to form stars and solar systems the Eastern scriptures call it the great serpent Ananta, the cosmic Kundalini. It is identified with the constellation of the Dragon and described as moving on the great ocean of milk, the immense ocean of solar globes in various stages of formation.
I visualised the three great fires as three suns using the photo of a sunrise over the Mediterranean. The fiery globes are connected by a downpour of light, where the lower receives from the higher and distributes the light in its turn.
I constructed the serpentine movement of the cosmic Kundalini spiralling through the various planes of creation with the help of elements from a photo of a ring galaxy. The head of the serpent is above and the tail in the lower sphere. It moves around the three fiery centres and creates the matrix for the further consolidation to the visible universe.
Aries – The Ruler of the Solar Dynasty
14 December 2014, pencils and photo work
The earliest legends of the history of India mention two dynasties, the “race of the Sun” and the “race of the Moon”. The Solar Dynasty of the “Sons of the Sun” was the first ray royal dynasty, to which Lord Rama belonged. Master Morya, who is of fiery nature, belongs to the Solar Dynasty and is its last representative. He is the Master of the sun sign Aries and represents the Fire on our planet.
For this painting I used the photo of a huge solar eruption and one of the crescent earth to symbolize the descent of the Sons of the Sun onto our planet. In the background I created the path of descent and spheres of blue and red indicating the process of reception.
At the bottom I placed a picture of Master Morya and merged two crowns for his headwear, with a solar disc in the background.
Aries – The Birth of a Butterfly
26 November 2013, pencils and photo work
Aries opens the astrological year and stands for the birth of spiritual man. It also symbolises the birth-place of an idea, of a spiritual impulse taking to a form.
The butterfly is a symbol of the soul. Just like the caterpillar is totally different from the chrysalis, the butterfly emerging out of it is again a totally different state: its light movements make it difficult to believe that such a being comes forth from the previous states.
In this painting I tried to illustrate the state of transformation we go through on our way to spiritual birth: you see a human head like a cocoon from out of which emerges a being of light with wings like a butterfly. I constructed the head using different layers of a picture of myself fused with a picture of Master CVV. In front of the head you see the merged pictures of an enlarged empty cocoon, a chrysalis with the butterfly still inside, and a butterfly just emerging – pictures of a Plain Tiger from an Indian friend. There is another butterfly in front of the head, like emerging out of it, and other ones are seen flying into the vastness of space.
Aries – The Birth of a Diamond
30 November 2012, pencils, crayons and photo work
This image illustrates the enormous pressure of today’s society, which can cause a transformation process. I visualised it with a volcano, symbol of throwing out matter from the inside through a fiery process of high pressure. At its top there is a diamond, as nature’s most brilliant result of a transformation process through pressure.
For the glowing magma chamber, I took pictures at the underground corridors and shopping passages at the central station of Berne and fused them together. Several volcanos and diamonds, together with a rose flower of an echinopsis cactus for the fiery flashes at the top gave the dramatic structure with lava flows and the “magma chamber” of the hectic everyday life.
Aries – The Mother Principle and the Descent in 10 Steps into Creation
20 November 2011, pencils, crayons and photo work
According to the Wisdom teachings, the Cosmic Person is the supreme God principle self-existing without mother and father. From there the Mother principle comes down and conceives the creation in her womb as her child. She comes down in 10 steps through 4 planes up to the gross material plane. The Mother is represented as a young lady, the planes are represented as spheres, and the10 points of the Pythagorean decade symbolise the complete creation. Its centre lies at the womb of the lady, the top of the triangle at her heart centre. She is standing in a lotus, the principle of unfoldment. In her inner she carries a form of Lord Vishnu, the Lord of permeation. There is a visualisation exercise where you imagine the Divine – be it Christ, Vishnu or whosoever –standing over the solar plexus and the meditator becoming one with him. The delicate figure of the Mother is standing in the area of tension between the seminal emergence and the tremendous power of the manifesting energies. She carries in her heart this tension between the delicacy and and the power of the presence of Vishnu.
Aries – The Fire of Life
04 March 2011, pencils, crayons and photo work
Aries is the most powerful sign, the beginning of a new annual cycle with spring equinox. The vital force is seen everywhere at work in nature. The energies of the sun bring a fresh impulse, and this is symbolised by the horse. There are seven rays of the one light, depicted as seven horses. You see them in the picture as coming out of a giant glyph of Aries which starts from the colours of dawn of the rising sun. Aries also rules the Head Centre, so you see in this picture the lotus of the Head Centre above the horses in radiant colours. Profound silence and highest dynamism at the same time are the contrasting elements of this image.
Aries
13 April 2010, pencils, crayons and photo work
The Wisdom Teachings explain that each year at the beginning of Aries there is a fresh new impulse coming from Higher Circles to be received by the Lord of the Planet, Sanat Kumara, and the sublime beings surrounding him in the second ether of the ashram of Shamballa in the Gobi desert. This energetic impulse is later, at Taurus full moon, handed on to Spiritual Hierarchy and their disciples to be further transmitted and disseminated at Gemini full moon to humanity at large, as a new vital impulse carrying life onwards.
This painting is done on a photo of the head of Master CVV. At the top you see the 12 signs of the zodiac blazing forth from the centre of light. The signs of the cardinal cross are forming the arms of the Swastika, where Cancer at the bottom is symbolising the descent of souls into matter. The nose and the eyebrows are forming the glyph of Aries. Through the nose, there is the down-breath of cosmic energies onto our earth. The part of the mouth is formed by Mount Kailash standing out high above the horizon. It is said to represent the head of Lord Shiva receiving the downpour of the cosmic flow of Ganga, the etheric waters of space.
The flames around Mount Kailash / the mouth represent the ashram of Shamballa.