[Today’s featured artwork for Day 87 of the 365 Days Project is by Vijali Hamilton.]
Can art heal the world? Here is one woman’s lifelong quest…
#87 – Art, music, dance, writing and all of the creative arts can not only heal the Artist, but they can also serve to heal the world.
Vijali Hamilton is a sculptor, poet, musician, performance artist and author. Her paintings and sculptures reflect deep spiritual values and her World Wheel – Global Peace Through the Arts project reaches out to cultures around the world, using art and performance towards a greater good.
Hamilton spent her early years as a monastic member of the Vedanta convent, before deciding to return to the world as a visual artist, receiving her Master’s Degree in Fine Arts and creating work that is now in over a thousand public and private collections.
In 1986, Hamilton started the World Wheel Project, an artistic forum for world peace consisting of two journeys, or World Wheels, where the artist would circle the globe and collaborate with diversified communities, utilizing her skills as a sculptor, filmmaker, poet, musician, and author to carve monumental stone sculptures and create collaborated ceremonial-based performance events that combine education, art, spirituality and peace activism and focus attention on the awareness of environmental, spiritual, and social problems.
“My environmental sculptures define sacred sites and are created with the assistance of each village,” said Hamilton. “The performances that are held in the site of the sculptures are a collaboration with myself, local artists, performers, and each host community. Through this process, the World Wheel provides a transformative experience for each community as it addresses spiritual, social, and ecological issues, activating an awareness of the interrelatedness of all life.”
In Greece, Vijali Hamilton fell in love with the Island of Tinos and its inhabitants. “I chose the beautiful Bay of Livada as one of the sites for the World Wheel,” said Hamilton. “On the windy cliffs overlooking the bay, I created ‘Woman Made of the Cosmos’, a blue and old giantess whom I dedicated to the wind.” (See image at the top of the article.)
“As a salute to water on the edge of the sea, I sculpted a large granite serpent that was totally submerged in steel gray waves when the sea churned.” (See image at the bottom of the article.) “I painted a sun-yellow design with car enamel. This 25-foot long serpentine megalith represents ancient Greek healing rites of the island, of sleeping in the presence of snakes. It also represents the ancient name of Tinos, Phidousa, ‘The Place of the Snake’.”
Vijali Hamilton spent seven years on her first World Wheel, which took her to Malibu, upstate New York, Spain, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Palestine/Israel, India, Tibet, China, Russia and Japan.
In 1999, Hamilton began her second World Wheel. “I knew,” she said, “that this would be my way of walking peace for the next period of my life – perhaps until my death.”
Vijali Hamilton continues to be one of the greatest inspirations as an artist who combines all of her creative talents towards a higher purpose.
Vijali Hamilton’s artwork can be viewed at: World Wheel Community
Description of the images included in this post:
Woman Made of the Cosmos (Greece)
Vijali Hamilton, New Mexico
Mixed media installation
Earth Wheel (Malibu, California) –
Vijali Hamilton, New Mexico
Mixed media installations
(Photo by Eric Lawton)
Serpent (Greece)
Vijali Hamilton, New Mexico
Car enamel
The 365 Days Project
In 2012, Serena Kovalosky committed to writing an article a day for 365 days as an exploration into the lives of artists and the value of creative thinking in our society.
Experience the full evolution of the project! Click below to read the entire collection of articles.
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