The sacred feminine in the
landscape is celebrated in photographs and stories
Visions of the Goddess
Photographs by Courtney
Milne, text by Sherrill Miller
Photographer Courtney Milne
and his wife Sherrill Miller celebrate the sacred feminine in the
landscape in this lush volume that will enhance any coffee table. I
regret not having studied Milne's previous books, Spirit of the
Land and The Sacred Earth, but I believe
Visions of the Goddess carries on in a similar vein.
It was a treat to meet Milne
and Miller and see their slide/lecture presentation in Vancouver,
which featured pictures in this book. They spoke of one of their
neighbors, a farmer in Saskatchewan who impressed them with his
advice that it's important to walk every day on uneven ground. This
literally down-to-earth attitude is the philosophy they advocate --
staying in close contact with Mother Earth.
Milne's photographs include
some well-known sacred sites, but mostly they're less identifiable.
For each place, Miller tells a story about a goddess that is
associated (albeit sometimes very loosely associated) with the
place.
With a picture of Cloutie
Well, near Inverness, Scotland, we learn about the Sulevia, Celtic
deities connected with healing waters in the British Isles. The
tradition of leaving strips of cloth at holy wells, in honor of the
Sulevia, or the Virgin Mary, is similar to rituals done at the
Bighorn Medicine Wheel in Wyoming, where Native Americans also leave
personal articles tied to the fence, invoking spiritual blessings.
An astonishingly beautiful
picture of Igassu Falls in Paraguay illustrates a legend of the
Guarani people, that there is a land without evil, called Iva Mara
Ei, land of eternal water, ruled by a female deity known as Our
Mother. When pilgrims arrive at her home, they are met, offered
food, and judged by a parrot, that only lets in those who are truly
humble.
Eye-dazzling scenes come
from Africa, Asia, Greece, Egypt, Hawaii, Australia, Greenland and
Iceland as well as North and South America, each with thoughtful
insights about various incarnations of the Goddess.
One regret is that a few of
the pictures are not strictly from nature, but multiple exposures,
computer enhanced images or taken through special filters. This
observer feels that the Goddess doesn't need such artificial help to
convey the message she has to tell.
Visions of the Goddess, Photographs by Courtney Milne, text
by Sherrill Miller, Penguin Studio, 1998, 128 pp, hardcover, 9"x9".
Review by Robert Scheer.
Read
Robert Scheer's blog.
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