Last night was the monthly discussion group I lead on Joe Campbell and his work on mythology. We watched him give a lecture on the Navajo myth “Where the Two Came to Their Father”, a warrior initiation myth. The myth itself was published by Maude Oakes who got the myth from Jeff King, an elder of his tribe who shared the ceremonial myth with her, it goes, because the young were not undergoing the time intensive training required to learn the story. So the myth and its pollen paintings were recorded in the book Where the Two Came to Their Father by Jeff King, Maude Oakes and commentary by Joe Campbell. We have 2 first edition copies of it in the Campbell library here in the archives available for research or perusal.
Here are 2 images from the book:
First pollen painting - image from pbagalleries.com
Image from theosociety.org
One of the observations Campbell makes in his lecture on this myth is the highly symbolic quality of the drawings. It is not that the Navajo didn’t know how to render animals and nature naturalistically, but that in these sacred paintings the images are rendered so to be transparent to the transcendent. In other words, they’re rendered in the form of their spiritual reference.
“It is not that the Navajo didn’t know how to render animals and nature naturalistically, but that in these sacred paintings the images are rendered so to be transparent to the transcendent. In other words, they’re rendered in the form of their spiritual reference.”
Campbell’s oberservation not only opens an understanding for Navajo art, but also for modern art and the origins of abstract painting (before it became a vehicle for one’s own personal feelings or mere decoration). Art needs to follow its own inner logic, rather than any personal or theoretical purposes. I hope you had a great conversation.
Hi Martin – absolutely and thank you for that observation about art itself – art does have its own energy, its own life, which seeks release through the artists hand.