PSYCHANODIA OCHEMA

~ SOUL ASCENT VEHICLE ~

       "All this kind of divination... is encompassed by one power which someone might call 'evoking the light.' This somehow illuminates the aether-like and luminous vehicle (aitherodes kai augoeides ochema) surrounding the soul with divine light, from which vehicle the divine appearances, set in motion by the gods' will, take possession of the imaginative power in us."

                                - Iamblichus, On the Mysteries, III. 14

       It was particularly through my reading of Iamblichus' On the Mysteries and John F. Finamore's Iamblichus and the Theory of the Vehicle of the Soul that I arrived at the title for this piece ~ Psychanodia Ochema ~ where Psychanodia is the Greek word for Soul Ascent, and Ochema is its Vehicle in the Neo-Platonic tradition.

THE DRAWING STAGE

       The initial drawing was begun as a collaboration with David Heskin when he and Aloria Weaver stayed at our Burgundian farmhouse as our guests in 2012. We were fascinated by the cube octahedron as a possible armature for the Divine Face, which we rendered (side by side) as a combination of a Byzantine Christ and Buddhist Bodhisattva.

THE WORK IN PROGRESS

       This painting had a long evolution, from a collaborative drawing to live painting to working on it at The Summer Seminar in Italy and The Vienna Academy of Visionary Art...

       The whole story is told in this 15-minute video.