The illuminated alchemical manuscript of the Splendor Solis is one of the Treasures of the British Library, and in recent years it has become widely known for the beauty of its 22 illuminated paintings.
Dyane Sherwood has been intrigued with this work for thirty years, and it has been twenty years since she and the late Joseph Henderson completed their book relating the process of transformation in analysis to its illuminated paintings. This lecture is a preview of her book in preparation.
Her appreciation for the sophisticated consciousness behind the Splendor Solis has grown, in particular, its clear depiction of different states, or perhaps stages, of awareness in three different series of paintings.
In this presentation, we will focus on the relevance of the Splendor Solis for the crises in our contemporary world. The Splendor Solis paintings include a critique of Greek heroic values and the need for a new appreciation of the feminine principle of relatedness.
Through a play of symbolic images as we move from one painting to the next, personifications of masculine and feminine characteristics challenge rigid cultural norms of what is male and female and emerge from the constraints of a patriarchal power dynamic.
How might this be achieved? We will discuss two hints from the Splendor Solis. First, according to the text, we are part of the natural world yet we have different intentions. Second, a painting (shown above) portrays an attitude of compassion for the suffering involved in the transformation of the very qualities that are “other” or “shadow.”
