The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth

As for me, our conversation made me start to think. Gradually the Esoteric Buddhism works grew on me, and made me confront religion and my relationship to it more directly. I finally remembered that there is a spiritual realm beyond monotheism and polytheism, and pantheism and panentheism, a realm in which disputes over doctrine and dogma seem petty and inconsequential, in which many of the western ideas associated with monotheism seem small and recede from view: a realm in which the divine process of creation really takes place. To insist on apprehending God as a personal agent rather than merely as an aspect of the world, to insist on a divinity which is male or female, or one or many—these matters arise from the human mind and grow out of human cultures: they are not aspects of the divine presence itself. The divine presence which Junko seeks in her art moves like a wind through Christianity and Buddhism, through monotheism and polytheism, in a realm beyond gender, beyond ethnicity, and beyond dogma. This is the realm in which centripetal art is born and Junko’s art, dancing freely in that realm, drew even me into it. In an often-quoted remark, Goethe said that he was a pantheist when it came to science, a polytheist in art, and a monotheist in ethics.5 This statement has provoked much discussion for it summarizes in a quotable capsule many ideas and prejudices we westerners take for granted. Science is a matter of study, entirely unemotional: in carrying it out, we must accord respect to everything we study, nothing should be beneath our attention, and everything should be seen as equally important. In art, we must be polytheists in order to abandon ourselves to the passions and appetites which, in Goethe’s view, are art’s special province. But in ethics, he thought, we must be monotheists. Yet this quotation, as attractive as it is, is anathema to Junko because it abandons the quest for integrity and elevates the lack of integrity to a principle. The real task after all is to integrate the scientist, the artist, and the moralist and to be one whole person whose honesty and integrity inform all our part two // Afterword p. 293

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth

PREFACE

-Definition of Centripetal Art -Its Place In Art History: After the Postmodern Period -Introducing the Subject Matter: One Centripetal Artist's Journey -The Relationship With Multiculturalism -After the Death of God and of Art

FOREWORD

-How the Author's Connection With His Wife's Art Grew More Intimate Over the Years -Learning In Marriage -"Why Does God Need To Paint?" [Section One] Individual Visitants -Dead Flowers and Root -Lungs and Rib Cage

CHAPTER FOUR - A Vital Spirituality

-Why This Art Could Not Have Been Created Earlier -Echoes of the Spiritual Arts of the Early 20th Century -The Impact of the Atomic Bomb; Ecological Concerns -Markers for Spirituality -Centripetal Art Overflows the Studio: Therapy

CHAPTER SIX - A Complex Spirituality

-Spirituality of the 21st Century

AFTERWORD - THE FURNACE

-Polytheism and Monotheism in Art -Goethe’s Aphorism -Marriage and the Alchemist’s Furnace Themes In Series

PREFACE

(Page I) The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth - -Definition of Centripetal Art (Page II) The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth - -The Relationship With Multiculturalism (Page III) The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth - -After the Death of God and of Art (Page IV) The Centripetal Art of Junko Chodos, Matrix of Spiritual Growth -

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