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ABSOLUTE IMAGE:
The Structure of Consciousness in Visual Form
By Lawrence Sheaff
PREVIEW
A follow-up interview with the artist/author by the book’s content editor, Dr. Bernard Bence
BERNARD BENCE: Your work as an artist is based upon the knowledge contained in Maharishi Vedic Science and Technology. Could you first tell us a little bit about this new science before you discuss the significance it has for the arts, which is the central theme of your book?
LAWRENCE SHEAFF: Since this new scientific knowledge revolutionises our understanding of the arts, first, as you say, it will be important to briefly describe it here. Maharishi Vedic Science (referred to throughout as MVS) is a new phenomenon in the field of science. It presents itself as the complete science of consciousness, the total knowledge of the laws of nature or natural law for our scientific age.
BB: It thus distinguishes itself from the partial or fragmentary knowledge of natural law delivered by our modern systems of scientific investigation.
LS: Exactly. And a civilization based on partial values of knowledge will always encounter problems.
BB: As past history and current events so clearly demonstrates to us. This is because the application of partial values of natural law is bound to cause violations of the laws of nature.
LS: Yes: and it is the violation of the laws of nature (either knowingly or unknowingly) in society that causes negative or destructive values to arise in human life.
BB: And does MVS offer a solution to this seemingly on-going dilemma?
LS: It does. MVS offers simple, natural programmes, like Transcendental Meditation® and its advanced techniques, for unfolding the full creative potential of every individual. It has been scientifically demonstrated by hundreds of published, peer-reviewed studies over the past forty years that these programmes bring human thought and action spontaneously into harmony with nature or natural law for a problem-free life.
BB: Then through education based on the total knowledge of natural law contained in MVS, negative-destructive values could quickly dissolve away from the individual and society and positive-creative values begin to fully blossom.
LS: Exactly so. It has already been shown that the application of MVS programmes in a society immediately brings relief to the great pressure of continually mounting problems both on the citizens of a nation as well as its administrators.
BB: Can you tell us what MVS is and what its origins are?
LS: MVS understands that the ancient Veda and Vedic Literature of India is the oldest, most complete system of knowledge in the world. Veda means ‘knowledge’ – the total knowledge of natural law. ‘Vedic’ means ‘pertaining to Veda’. This most ancient scientific knowledge has been revived in its completeness by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in recent decades in the form of Maharishi Vedic Science and TechnologySM. It has been thoroughly integrated with all the latest findings in modern science. As said, because MVS is ‘holistic knowledge’ it activates a total value of organizing power that is in complete harmony with all the laws of nature or natural law.
BB: Has all this been more fully explained in the book and has the revolutionary impact this new and complete knowledge of natural law has on the visual arts been explored in detail?
LS: That’s correct. The book explores in detail how the application of this comprehensive science of consciousness to the visual arts completely transforms the three basic components of the visual arts defined as 1) the artist, 2) the art-object and, 3) the viewer of art.
BB: You discuss how it unfolds the very foundations of what you call ‘our visual aesthetic reality’ and offers a new scientific basis for defining absolute values in the visual arts. These new foundational principles revolutionise our understanding of the discipline by revealing its infinite nature, and, at the same time, offers practical programmes for fully activating that unbounded cosmic potential in any cultural setting.
LS: Yes. MVS both reveals and begins to actualise the fullest cosmic potential of the three basic components of the visual arts mentioned above, the artist, the art-object, and the viewer of art. It opens the way to ‘consciousness-based art’ for every artist – art in harmony with the evolutionary power of total natural law for the fulfillment of every artist and for glorifying and enriching a nation’s cultural life as a whole.
