Art, Symbol & Imagination
An Aspiration to Enfold All
Figure 38 represents, in Besant and Leadbeater's account, a meditator's wish to embrace all humanity and draw it toward a higher ideal. Its fine violet-blue lines curve outward and return to their base around a yellow centre, turning that intention into an enclosing, ribbon-like form. The authors explain that the intricate design was made with a machine because hand drawing and ordinary pigments could not convey the delicate line or the luminosity they claimed to observe. It is therefore both an image of Theosophical aspiration and an acknowledged attempt to translate a claimed clairvoyant experience into print, not an experimentally established picture of thought.
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Citation
"An Aspiration to Enfold All" [editorial title]. In Thought-Forms, Annie Besant and C. W. Leadbeater. 1905, Theosophical Publishing Society. Source scan leaf 48. Lumitheca. /gallery/image/art-thought-ribbon
Source details
Editorial title and description. Source details from the Library catalogue.
The figure number is visible in the plate. Violet is the authors' colour designation; the supplied reproduction appears blue-violet. No specific machine or individual artist is identified for this plate.
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An Aspiration to Enfold All. Thought-Forms. Scan leaf 48. Lumitheca. https://lumitheca.com/gallery/image/art-thought-ribbon