Certainty amid the chaos.TO KNOW WHAT MATTERS AND WHAT DOES NOT is the lesson that we long to be taught. Mondrian's Still Life With Gingerpot II shows us a geometrical tangle of incoherent lines, which might or might not have a meaning. But at the center of all this--pure, rounded, and still--gleams the pot, the one satisfying certainty amid the existential ex·is·ten·tial adj. 1. Of, relating to, or dealing with existence. 2. Based on experience; empirical. 3. Of or as conceived by existentialism or existentialists: chaos. It is only when we are still, when we open up to our inner reality, that the things in our life fall into coherence coherence, constant phase difference in two or more Waves over time. Two waves are said to be in phase if their crests and troughs meet at the same place at the same time, and the waves are out of phase if the crests of one meet the troughs of another. for us. We do not necessarily have to think this out: Silence makes the order plain. But instead we quiet our restless minds, and then rise to find that we now see the essential. SISTER WENDY BECKETT Sister Wendy Beckett (born February 25 1930) is a South African-born British art expert, consecrated virgin and contemplative hermit who became an unlikely celebrity during the 1990s, presenting a series of acclaimed art history documentaries for the BBC. of Norfolk, England, well-known for her BBC BBC in full British Broadcasting Corp. Publicly financed broadcasting system in Britain. A private company at its founding in 1922, it was replaced by a public corporation under royal charter in 1927. and PBS PBS in full Public Broadcasting Service Private, nonprofit U.S. corporation of public television stations. PBS provides its member stations, which are supported by public funds and private contributions rather than by commercials, with educational, cultural, television art series and her popular art books. Reprinted with permission from: Sister Wendy's Book of Meditations (DK Publishing, 1998; 888-342-5357). Painting: Still Life With Gingerpot II, 1911-12, by Piet Mondrian (Haags Gemeente Museum, The Hague, Netherlands). |
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