2024/04/12
How to Navigate the Legacy Blog of Henri van Bentum, 1929 - 2022
2024/04/01
Remembering With Joy, Artist Henri van Bentum (1929-2022), and the healing power of Art
On the Healing Power of Art
"Henri, the 'Maestro',
lives on in our hearts and minds
every day." Natasha van Bentum
≈≈≈
What is a Creative Person Like? (written by Henri many years ago)
Are observant of the world
about them
Are aware of the feel and
touch of things
Listen to the sound of
life around them
Are sensitive to smell
Are aware of the taste of
things
THEY LIKE TO ‘BUILD’ THEIR IDEAS
Like to construct things
in material
Prefer to rearrange old
ideas into new relationships
Like to experiment with
various approaches and media
Like to try out new
methods and techniques
Prefer to manipulate their
ideas in various ways
Have to solve problems set
by themselves
Seek to push beyond the
boundaries of their thinking
THEY LIKE TO EXPLORE NEW IDEAS
Are original in their
thoughts about things
Like to invent new ways of
saying and telling
Like to dream up new
possibilities
Like to imagine and
pretend
THEY ARE CONFIDENT IN THEMSELVES
Flexible in approaches to
situations
Like to be independent and
on their own
Are outwardly expressive
of what they have to say
Are not afraid of
emotional feelings and show them
THEY LIKE TO INVESTIGATE THE NATURE OF THINGS
Like to search for the meaning of things
Question available data
and information
Like to inquire into
unknown quantities
Discover new relationships
Desire to uncover new
meanings
THEY RESPOND TO AESTHETIC STIMULI
Are sensitive to the
beauty of nature
Appreciate beauty man has
made and
Which nature abundantly
provides
Have feeling for harmony
and rhythm
Love to sing, write,
explore, cook,
act, sculpt, draw, paint
or dance.
2023/05/27
The Deployment of Henri's Reef off the coast of Vancouver Island - Artist Henri van Bentum, 1929-2022
2023/05/26
More photos from the deployment of Henri's Reef
Here are some screen captures from a video by Living Reef Memorial of the deployment of Henri's Reef exactly two weeks ago, on May 27th.
More details about the Living Reef can be found in the earlier post, published on the same day (scroll below).
2023/05/24
Henri was a keen Snooker player, he would have enjoyed this:
This week my quasi-spoof, quasi-serious document, called "The Society for the Protection of Snooker Tables - An Endangered Species", was hung in the Billiards Room of the historic Union Club of British Columbia. My beloved partner of fifty-one years, artist and keen snooker player, Henri van Bentum, (1929-2022) would have enjoyed it.
2023/05/05
Celebrating Light: A Journey Through the Organiverse with Works by Rabindranath Tagore ("Gitanjali") and Henri van Bentum
As a way of introducing the Gitanjali / Organiverse project (see post of February15th ), we've linked up with the UNESCO International Day of Light 2023 to introduce one of Rabindranath Tagore's poems (#57, "Light") and one of Henri van Bentum's 'Organiverse' mandalas (#57 of #100 set). The site has a link to the full project, encompassing all 100 mandalas and 100 poems. https://vanbentum.wixsite.com/journey
2023/02/15
Special Edition of "Gitanjali and Beyond" devoted to Henri van Bentum's "Organiverse" mandalas and featuring a reading of the "Gitanjali" song offerings (poems) by Rabindranath Tagore
Cover of "Gitanjali and Beyond", Issue No. 7, Rabindranath Tagore, Henri van Bentum
Today the Scottish Centre for Tagore Studies published its annual eJournal, "Gitanjali & Beyond", devoted to a project marrying the 100 Organiverse mandalas by Henri van Bentum (1929-2022) with the 'Song Offerings' (Gitanjali) of Rabindranath Tagore. In 1913, Rabindranath Tagore won the Nobel Prize in Literature for "Gitanjali".
The concept and production of this project was done by Henri's friend Brian W.E. Johnson, who reads Tagore's poems.
Here is the link.
"When Natasha van Bentum first wrote to me about her husband, Henri van Bentum’s 100 Mandalas (created in 1972) which have been recently structured as reflections on Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali poems, I was intrigued. I asked Natasha to send me samples of this project, and she was willing to send me the entire opus of Organiverse and Gitanjali.
The compositions, completed while Henri and Natasha lived on the island of Madeira, are done in pointillism in water colour. They are intricate and intense. The idea of mandalas with their Hindu and Buddhist symbolism, signify a universal search for release from suffering, reaching out towards an unutterable joy.
. . . Henri’s mandalas, with their perfect circular pattern, encompass and visualise worlds that unfold from the first blue representation of the pondering universe and go on to explore and explode in colours that come together like the rising sun, the colours of the rainbow, unfurling petals, swirling dreams, bursting stars, crystallising shapes which are infinite in their possibilities and suggestiveness, till the final ones that speak of life’s fulfilment reflected in the image of the rising sun, meditative and expectant in its promise of life’s continuity.
. . . Henri’s positive approach to life in spite of the many obstacles he encountered, his courage and success are apparent in these mandalas which defeat the idea of chaos with their cosmic energy that is both transformative and transporting. They represent life itself in its many manifestations and speak directly to the viewer with an appeal that is mesmerising.