Jan 24, 2022

Trainings and programs to celebrate the Arts

2022 marks the centenary of the burning of the first Goetheanum.

It stood on the Dornach hill for only ten years – then it was destroyed by fire on New Year’s Eve in 1922/23. From 1913 to 1922, artists from 17 different nations created a unique work of art from all artistic genres, making a new creative impulse visible. At the same time, the first Goetheanum forms and motifs offered a mirror for the perception of one’s own destiny.

In the context of the 100th anniversary of the fire, artists around the world are working with the forms and motifs of the 1st Goetheanum. They are also offering lectures and courses to help realise Rudolf Steiner’s vision of a new impulse in the arts and make the design impulse of the first Goetheanum visible and tangible. 
 
If you feel your soul life could do with more nourishment and rejuvenation, there are new courses about to begin that work directly with the forms and motifs of the first Goetheanum. These are wonderful new opportunities for both professional and personal development and renewal, and since online is international, a few offerings from our colleagues at the Goetheanum and in England have been included, for the early risers and night owls amongst you. 
 

There is also a new curative eurythmy training in Melbourne and three on-the-ground arts-based weekend events to deepen the work begun online. Here is a round-up of current and upcoming artistic programs on offer.

On the theme of the art of the 1st Goetheanum

Artist and researcher Fiona Campbell has two new online courses working with a selection of the pastel and watercolour motifs Steiner gave to the painters. Both courses will culminate in an on-the-ground weekend art intensive 4-5 June:
Working with Steiner’s epoch motifs as a training for the ordering of the soul-life is an online practice-based 7-session course from 12 February to 23 May for anyone and everyone longing to understand more about the spiritual history of humanity. It combines lectures, study, drawing and contemplation. No drawing skills required. 
 
The online masterclass studio on the Nine Training Sketches is for those with painting skills. Work alongside Fiona as she paints towards an exhibition on the theme from artists round the world. This is an ideal course for those beyond the beginner stage in painting and interested in the experiencing how Steiner’s training sketches work upon our soul-life. Starts 4 February.

International online lectures

The Visual Art Section at the Goetheanum is offering a series of lectures until Christmas 2022. Some of the lectures have been and will be recorded as videos and can be viewed on Goetheanum TV. There are already video lectures on the first Goetheanum as a total work of art, soon to be translated into English.
 
Other lectures will follow, beginning with architecture, then sculpture from February to May, then painting and glass art. You can attend the lectures on site or on video. More information (in German) on the lecture series on Architecture can be found here. You can find out more about what’s happening on this theme in the coming months here.
 
And for early birds, there is a series of online seminars (in English) on the Representative of Humanity sculptural group, hosted by our friends at Rudolf Steiner House in London, UK. The series has already just begun but there are several upcoming free seminars you can still join in the coming months. 

Other artistic courses on offer

A new curative eurythmy training begins!

On the ground, a brand new 2-year part-time training in Curative Eurythmy launches on 2 February at Aurora Australis Anthroposophical College of the Arts. Eurythmists Birgith Lugosi and Susan Gould lead the training, which includes lectures in homeopathy and cosmology.
 
Please contact Birgith Lugosi if you’d like to know more both about this new training or other artistic courses at Aurora Australis.  
 

Storytelling and writing

In early March, the Heart in a Radiance of Stars, a Heartwood offering, begins, using storytelling, research, visual exercises and conversation to explore heart-thinking and the etheric heart, to find greater strength and insight to meet current challenges. Please contact Iris Curteis for more information.

 

And finally …

After a number of postponements, the 2nd Etheric Geography Conference, hosted by the NSW Branch will finally take place in rural NSW at Linuwel School. Building on the first conference in 2019 and the World Script webinars that replaced the 2021 conference, the theme explores the effect of our thinking on the health of our ecosystems. Lectures, nature observation and sketching, contemplation, eurythmy and sharing. 

And don’t forget to check out the existing artistic, educational and professional development courses and trainings from round Australia under Adult Education and Training. 

Good wishes for your new (and old) endeavours this coming year! 

 

Fiona Campbell
Website editor

 

Photo credit: Creative Commons from Rosmarie Voegtli

Note: Photo compilation of the interior of the first Goetheanum as planned by Steiner. The layout is distorted because several photos, shot at different angles, have been stitched together. The structure consisted of two domed spaces — a small dome on the left, a large one on the right.