Notre Dame Limited Edition Print
Meditating on this mandala connects you with the balance of the Divine Feminine and Masculine energies.
Paris has always been a city close to my heart. I spent a lot of time there as a child and always as we crossed the bridge onto Ile de la Citè, a sense of calm would come over me. It was as though I could breathe again. When I saw the fire ravaging Notre Dame Cathedral in April, it brought me to tears. There was something so destructive, yet also so regenerating about it. Fire destroys, but also offers rebirth and renewal.
I thought about the beautiful rose windows...and my heart broke. I am so glad that they miraculously survived. But that night, I felt compelled to begin to create this piece in honour of Notre Dame, of what is past and what is yet to come on that sacred site.
It took 200 years to build the Cathedral...and life expectancy was of course much shorter back then and so I figure it was around 4-5 generations in the making. So the people who began it never saw it finished. Like planting a tree for the future, they put their hearts and souls into this beautiful building never seeing the end result of their work. I thought of them. Notre Dame and Ile de la Citè always felt like the belly of Paris to me. The heart centre of that beautiful city. So many wonderful works of literature have been set there, from Victor Hugo to Emile Zola...and even I remember one of my favourite Nancy Drew books 'The 99 Steps', which I loved as a child! Notre Dame existed in our collective imagination, even for those who had never been there.
Mankind's architectural creations are one of humanity's finest and easily identifiable symbolic achievements. It was an iconic building and seeing it burn brought a real sense of the impermanence of all things, and a feeling of discomfort at that. It brought a sense of the fragility of our physical and symbolic constructions. Even though we logically know that all things are impermanent, that they will one day fall apart and that as Osho said, 'society is but a clearing in the forest', we still feel it strongly in our bellies. Notre Dame was a an iconic symbol of France, a symbol of religion and, a symbol of civilization. It was an interesting feeling.
Prints are available in two sizes, framed or unframed.
Options
30cm x 30cm mounted print (unframed)
30cm x 30cm mounted and framed with glass and white frame
50cm x 50cm unframed (posted rolled in a tube, so a great option for overseas)
50cm x 50cm mounted and framed with glass and white frame
50cm x 50cm tray framed (printed on a beautiful board, so no glass is necessary. No distracting reflections. A white box/tray frame surrounds the print.
**Prints may take up to two weeks to prepare, especially if being framed. So do let me know if you need it sooner and I will get in touch with my framer to see what he can do! Thank you!
