Abstract Photography: A Bridge to Imaginal Worlds

RYAN BUSH, PH.D.

ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Introduction
When I arrived in New York a few days before the 2012 Art and Psyche Conference, it
felt wonderful to be immersed in the city, surrounded by so many things to see and
experience. I immediately experienced the pull of fascinating things all around me that
I felt compelled to photograph. Overhead, towering giants slowly dance (Fig. 1), or
embrace over the decades and centuries (Fig. 2, 3). I am just as fascinated by the
exposed steel bones of the city (Fig. 4), and by the signs of constant rebuilding and
renewal (Fig. 5). Mysteries are hidden under our feet in the lowliest of manhole covers
(Fig. 6), or in the sidewalk grates (Fig. 7). I especially love the overhead wires, which
have their own music, as in these photographs that I took in Zurich (Fig. 8, 9 10).

Fig. 1 Fig. 2 Fig. 3

Fig. 4 Fig. 5 Fig. 6

Fig. 7 Fig. 8 Fig. 9

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 2
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Fig. 10

Ever since I started making photographs (around 1998), I have been drawn to abstract
images: patterns, textures, lines, simple geometric shapes, and rhythms. As I worked
more with abstract photographs and learned more about Jungian psychology, I began to
realize that creating abstract photographs is about much more than making a beautiful
image. It is about making a connection with something deeper, a hidden intermediate
level of reality where matter and spirit meet. That intermediate world is the psychoid in
analytical psychology, or the imaginal world as it is called by Henri Corbin in the
tradition of Sufism or mystical Islam, which I will be referring to because of its in-depth
systematic analysis of imagination, and its understanding of the invisible world that we
have largely lost sight of in our materially-oriented Western culture.

I will be talking about how abstract photography makes a bridge between this world and
the imaginal world, or the psychoid1. That is the very relationship between art, the
psyche, and the city, in my view: the art comes out of the interaction between the psyche
and the city (or whatever surroundings you are in); abstract photography comes from
the meeting of matter and spirit. Understanding these concepts from analytical
psychology and Sufism has been invaluable to me in my development as an abstract
photographer.

What is abstract photography?

But first, I should say more about what I mean by abstract photography. As in all types
of art, photographs range from representational to abstract (Fig. 11)

Fig.11
more representational more abstract

1
In analytical psychology, the psychoid is a place in between the conscious and unconscious.

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 3
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

On the left side is a photograph that clearly represents a tree in a landscape. It is one of
my early photographs where I was not always as abstract. And even though it does not
show the tree exactly as our eyes would see it, it still represents the tree fairly faithfully.

On the right side is a much more abstract photograph of a tree. I will be talking more
about this series of photographs later, but for now I just want to show it as an example
of an abstract photograph. While you can tell that there are branches and it looks
somewhat like a tree, I have abstracted away from the tree’s literal appearance and
focused on other qualities.

There are also photographs that are in the middle, somewhat representational and
somewhat abstract, like this center photograph. You can still tell pretty easily what it is,
but some qualities of the tree are emphasized more than others, and the goal is not to
have as literal a representation as the photograph on the left. This series of photos
represents for me what I mean by abstract photography; when you move from the
middle to the right side of the spectrum, you can see that the focus is not primarily on
representing something from this world literally.

Photographs can become even more abstract than this, where it is an even greater
challenge to recognize anything from the known external world. Even when conscious
appreciation of the concrete object is difficult to grasp, it is important to remember that
the photograph always begins with an existing physical object. . Even if you are
photographing a beam of light, you are always capturing an image of something
somewhere, so there is always a connection to our concrete, physical reality. And that is
part of the inherent tension that I like about abstract photography.

So, how do you make an abstract photograph, since you are always photographing
something in this world? One way is to isolate things from their ordinary context,
focusing in on the object by itself. For example, the photograph that I showed earlier
(Fig. 6) is obviously a manhole cover, but we do not usually appreciate these discs
beneath our feet as we walk by. For the most part, we make a gross
evaluation/perception and notice something round and metallic. The brain says “Yeah,
yeah, it’s a manhole cover,” and we keep walking. But with a more thoughtful and astute
eye, you see the lines, shapes, textures and beauty that actually exist as a part of
functional city equipment. Photographing details in this way encourages the viewer to
see artistic design that calls for more focused attention; art is abundant in everyday
objects that are essential to city life

There are many other ways to make abstract photographs, too. For example, you can
photograph things at a very small scale, as with these close-up photographs of plants.
(Figs. 12, 13, 14) Each of the photographs is an extreme close-up of leaves, just about
half an inch or an inch wide, and when you look closely, you see the leaves in an entirely
different way; you see them as entire worlds unto themselves. (Figs. 15, 16)

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 4
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Fig. 12 Fig. 13 Fig. 14

Fig. 15 Fig. 16

You can also use alternative photographic processes to show things in a different light,
like this photograph where I inverted the image by “cross-printing” a color image on
black and white paper in the darkroom to give the feeling of an explosion of energy (Fig.
17). I call this image Genesis I used a different photographic process in this image (Fig.
18), where I took an ordinary daylight photograph of a tree, and inverted it in the
darkroom so it looks like a flash of lightening against the night sky. Or as in my most
recent series of photographs, you can get mysterious effects by building up multiple
exposures (Fig. 19), or by photographing layered images. (Fig. 20)

Fig. 17 Fig. 18 Fig. 19

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 5
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Fig. 20

So, there are many different ways to make abstract photographs, but the critical issue
involves techniques that open the possibility for the viewer to experience the subject of
the picture in unique ways that diverge from how one would commonly perceive it.
There is a transit from the every day to the imaginal. In all my photographs, I use a
relatively sparse visual language to create a seemingly simple combination of geometric
shapes, lines, curves, and textures, with a generally meditative tone. Through creative
use of these elements the photographs move toward the territory of abstraction and
connection to the symbolic, mysterious world of imagination. Here, I offer a brief precis
of some types of abstract photographs to orient the reader to what will come as a more
in depth discussion later in the paper. .

By way of background, I will note some of the many abstract photographers who have
inspired me including Aaron Siskind, Imogen Cunningham, Charles Sheeler, Harry
Callahan, and Mark Citret. And there are many abstract painters who have also inspired
me such as Richard Diebenkorn, Mark Rothko, Brice Marsden, Jackson Pollock, Cy
Twombly, and Piet Mondrian. Abstract painting and other artistic media are different
from abstract photography in that they are free to directly depict the world of the psyche
without necessarily having a direct tie to our outer ordinary world.

That can be a wonderful approach to take, but I, personally, prefer my art to maintain a
direct connection to this world, to the city around us, for example. After all, to find
amazing beauty, it is not necessary to go into the realm of pure imagination or go to
another continent; creativity and beauty surround us, hidden in plain sight in lowly
manhole covers, electric wires, and the simplest trees. Art and the psyche are in the city,
or in your backyard, or wherever you are, whenever you turn an appreciative and
reflective eye.

“But What IS it?”

One response that I often get when people look at my abstract photographs is that they
ask “But what IS it?” This is a very natural question and sometimes, with some images, I
respond directly by telling what the original referent is while, when asked about other
pictures, I like to keep things open and ask, “Well, what do you think it is?” This opens a
discussion of shared imagination.

Abstract photographs often carry a sense of mystery that invokes associations similar to
those that come with a dream image. By naming the specific subject of the photograph,

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 6
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

the understanding tends to become concrete, losing a sense of mystery, thus collapsing
the imaginal space. So with photographs like these (Figs. 21, 22), I prefer to let the
viewer struggle with the unknown in a way that perpetuates an immersion in mystery.
Earlier, I mentioned that abstract photography is about revealing things in a way that
opens the viewer to seeing common objects with a new sense of perception; it is not
necessary in this process to show all the details of what the object really looks like.
Sometimes by omitting some details and making an object harder to recognize, the
mystery draws the viewer in and stimulates attention beyond the literal object to the
process of really seeing through to the imaginal; stopping with the concrete object short
circuits the potential for the aliveness that comes into play when the unknown is
privileged as an element of the viewer’s interaction with the work of art.

Fig. 21 Fig. 22

Here are some images where I like to keep a sense of mystery about what the subject
really is. (Figs. 23, 24, 25)

Fig. 23 Fig. 24 Fig. 25

Sometimes other artists give very concrete names to their photographs, which I think
interferes with the process of projection, and with what the image might evoke in the
viewer’s imagination. For example, take two famous photographs by Edward Weston,
with their sensuous curves reminiscent of a human body. The names Pepper (Fig. 26)
and Nautilus Shell (Fig. 27) keep the image too anchored to ordinary reality, in my
opinion. After all, these photographs are not just about a pepper, or a nautilus shell,
there is also a connection to the world of imagination, mystery, and the soul. In my

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 7
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

photographs, I generally use more symbolic words for titles that either suggest a
connection to the world of imagination, or at least do not discourage that connection.

Fig. 26 Fig. 27

For example, I call my series of wire photographs (Figs. 8, 9, 10). The name refers not
just to the formal nature of the photographs’ compositions, but also to musical
compositions, for the music that I hear when I see the wires, so reminiscent of strings on
musical instruments or the lines of a score.

Different Ways of Seeing

I have previously noted how important it is to really look beyond the manifest object to
see in depth with psychological mindedness and I would like to further pursue this
theme here. I believe there are three different levels of seeing, ordinary sight, true
seeing and creative imagination. The first level of seeing, ordinary sight, is what we
normally do every day when we look around as we go about our lives. We see lots of
things, but unless they are novel or unusual, our brains just tune them out; we tend to
accept our daily environment with little reflective function. Although such inclinations
are adaptive and necessary, we risk missing the value and beauty in the ordinary and the
potential mysteries that are so close at hand, if reflective consciousness can be
employed. Moving at a quick pace, it is all too easy to remain in the fog of ordinary sight
and miss the deeper qualities of our surroundings. For example, one might notice a
pretty tree and not pursue threads of interest that could lead to appreciation of details
and subtleties that could open the possibility of enriching aesthetic experiences that
come with genuine interaction among the mind, body and surround.

By slowing down, one has the opportunity to really pay attention to the tree and a
myriad of fascinating aspects come forward. Awareness dawns and you as observer
realize that this living tree is so much more than a cartoon-like, big, round, lollipop
shape reminiscent of what young children draw. The branches move out into space at
amazing angles, and there is a wonderful contrast between the thick and thin branches
and between straight and curved lines. I call this kind of awareness, the second level of
seeing or true seeing where we perceive things as they actually are in this world whereby
we become aware of the details and textures and little things that we usually overlook.
This does not imply getting a supposedly objective view of reality, because our
perceptions are always colored by personal emotional states and psychological
projections so pure objectivity is impossible. From my view, true seeing does not mean
looking into a deeper level of reality; rather, it has to do with seeing what is actually

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 8
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

there in front of your eyes, instead of going about in that fog of ordinary sight. This is
what is referred to as mindful presence these days in psychology. It is what happens
when we are mindfully present to our bodies and senses and see things more for the way
they are. Jungians might think of this as employing the sensate function.

Sufism has a wonderful metaphor for the problem of how to really see what is around
us- they talk of various “veils” that cover our sight, as in this quote:

The most pressing of tasks… is to lift the veil that prevents the self from seeing itself
and others.
(Chittick 1998, p. 120)

While Chittick says that you cannot understand things around you until you understand
yourself, I would say that it can actually work in both directions. By really seeing what is
around us, we can start to understand it better, and use that as a means to recognize
parts of ourselves. For example, after working on photographs of electric wires for a
while, I better understood the part of myself that related to the wires’ lyric rationality
and simple grace.

As an example of the veils that cover our sight, I remember a day that I was
photographing some old buildings in Sacramento, California. I came upon a house with
old, white shingles. I was really drawn to the quiet, meditative lines and rhythms of the
shingles, and made this photograph (Fig. 28). After I was done, I noticed a woman on
the sidewalk staring at me. “Do you always take pictures of nothing?” she asked. “It is
hardly nothing, there is so much here,” I replied and brought her over to show her what
I was seeing. She just did not get it, though, and shook her head as she went on her way.

Fig. 28

One of the roles of art is to help others see what is actually around us, as Paul Klee
wonderfully said,

Art does not reproduce the visible, rather it makes it visible.

(as quoted in Edschmid 1920, p. 28)

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 9
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

If we as artists can lift the veils that cover our own sight, we can try to share what we see
with others, so they might perhaps lift their own veils as well. It does not always work,
but we still have to try.

For many years I was happy making abstract photographs with just true sight showing
things as they actually are, like figures 29, 30, and 31. I love how they show the rhythm
and music of the tree branches, and the first of them is named Gymnopedie after the
famous piano pieces by Erik Satie. But I could not help feeling that something was
missing, that it did not fully capture how I feel when I look at the bare tree branches.
When I look at them, I feel awe and wonder at the infinite complexity, the overlapping
rhythms and movement and music. There is a solitude of the trees as they lay in wait
during the winter, not dead, but resting until the creative energy can burst forth again
after the winter has passed.

Fig. 29 Fig. 30 Fig. 31

I realized that I was imagining a kind of photograph that could show more of that
feeling, showing not just the visible world, but some of the invisible world as well. After
a lot of trial and error, I ended up with a new series of photographs, called Memoria
(Fig. 19).

Unlike with true seeing, this image does not look as much like a tree literally does in this
world; instead it shows a deeper level, some of the essence inside. This way of seeing is
what some call the mind’s eye, or visualization, or creative imagination, as it is referred
to in the Sufi tradition. I call this the third level of seeing, creative imagination. This
type of perception combines what is actually out there in the world with inner
imagination, creating something new and different similar to Jung’s transcendent
function that emerges through a conjunction of the two.

Ansel Adams described it this way:

The visualization of a photograph involves the intuitive search for meaning, shape,
form, texture, and the projection of the image-format on the subject. The image
forms in the mind–is visualized…The creative artist is constantly roving the worlds
without, and creating new worlds within.
(Adams 1996, p. 78)

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 10
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Ibn ‘Arabi, the great Sufi mystic from the 12th century, talked about different levels of
seeing as the light of eyesight or unveiling, which corresponds to what I call true seeing,
and the light of insight or knowledge, which corresponds to creative imagination.

The sensory and suprasensory lights are ranked in layers, some of which are
more excellent than others
(Chittick 1998, p. 160)

Henry Corbin, one of the greatest interpreters of Ibn ‘Arabi’s work, called this higher
level of sight, creative imagination, or active imagination:

The visible which cannot be seen... is perceptible only by the Active Imagination...
A mystic perception is required... to perceive [the deeper reality] through the
figures which they manifest...
(Corbin 1989, p. 189)

The ‘place’ of this encounter is... in the manner of a bridge joining the two banks
of a river. ... A method of understanding which transmutes sensory data and
rational concepts into symbols.
(Ibid.)

By the way, I should point out that what Corbin means by ‘active imagination’ is not
quite the same as the Jungian sense of a dialogue with the unconscious. Both involve an
interaction with the imaginal world, with the psychoid, but the Jungian type of active
imagination has more ego involvement, so the ego can have a dialogue with the
unconscious. To avoid confusion, I will use the term “creative imagination” as the name
for the type of seeing we use to perceive the imaginal world.

Thinking of Corbin’s quote about the imaginal world as a bridge joining the two banks of
a river, it is fascinating how a similar metaphor was also used by Hildegard von Bingen,
the 12th century Christian mystic, who believed that the five senses (sight, hearing,
taste, smell, and touch), are a bridge that connects us to the eternal (Schipperges 1997,
p. 10).

Going back to the Memoria series of photographs, now that I could imagine what I
wanted to do, to connect with the deeper essence of the trees, with the symbolic and the
eternal, I needed to actually create the photographs. After listening to a lot of classical
music that uses “looping” techniques to build up complex textures of sound by sampling
small parts of music, I got the inspiration to do something similar with photographs,
using multiple exposures. Since my camera did not have a built-in way to do multiple
exposures, I had to come up with my own process to make it possible. This photograph,
for example, combines together four different exposures of the same tree, from slightly
different angles.

The Memoria series came out of a difficult period when I was going through a number
of personal losses. I was thinking about how memories get built up in layers as you think
about something again and again. In the same way, the multiple exposures in each

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 11
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

photograph get built up layer by layer, all done in the camera rather than using
Photoshop, to reflect the spontaneous, alchemical, and intuitive processes of the psyche
and the imagination. I will often have an idea of what kind of image I would like to
make, but you never know how it will turn out, and there are always surprises and
mysteries. Quite often, what I end up with is much more satisfying than what I had
originally intended to do. (Figs. 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37)

Fig. 32 Fig. 33 Fig. 34

Fig. 35 Fig. 36 Fig. 37

At a gallery opening where I was showing this series, a young man who grew up in
Maine told me that these photographs really capture how the trees feel to him, even
though they are not how they literally look. When I was first working on this series,
though, part of me felt conflicted about not representing how the trees literally look. In
the modern Western world, we tend to highly value rational thought and supposedly
objective perception, while dismissing other forms of seeing and knowing. Just as some
people think of dreams as mere fantasy, they look down on so-called “figments of the
imagination,” and say you are just seeing things. Even for those of us who are not so
dismissive of imagination, there can still be a lingering attitude that imagination is just
in your head, it is in no sense real, and is somehow less important than physical reality.

Many abstract artists, however, feel that what you imagine is real in some sense. Josef
Albers, for example, who painted the famous series Homage to the Square (1959), said:

For me, abstraction is real, probably more real than nature

(1996, p.45).

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 12
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Constantin Brancusi, known for his abstract sculptures like Bird in Space (date), said:

That which they call abstract is the most realistic, because what is real is not the
exterior but the idea, the essence of things
(as quoted in Design & Art Magazine, 2013).

Jungians, of course, know that the contents of the psyche have their own level of reality,
as in this quote from Jung:

The place or the medium of realization is neither mind nor matter, but that
intermediate realm of subtle reality which can be adequately expressed only by
the symbol.

(Jung 1968, para., 400)

In analytical psychology, this level of reality is referred to as the psychoid, which is the
psychic realm between the conscious and the unconscious. It is the place where “both
psychic image and physical instinct mix together, where they unite” (Samuels et al.,
1986 p. 122); it is the place of archetypes (Adams and Duncan2003,p.,29) and the
collective unconscious (Rossi 2004 p. 150), and the world of shamans (Mann
2006).What page number for Mann?

Imaginal Worlds
This level of reality is also recognized in the Sufi tradition, in the works of great
philosophers like Avicenna and Ibn ‘Arabi, from the 11th and 12th centuries. According
to Sufism, when you imagine something, it is an actual act of creation, and that is why
they call it creative imagination. Just as God created the universe by imagining it, in the
same way you are creating things when you imagine them. You are not creating things
made of solid matter, though, but things made of subtle matter, a mixture of matter and
spirit. These things created by imagination exist in a mysterious intermediate world
between our physical world and the completely non-physical world of the spirit. Like the
psychoid in analytical psychology, this in-between world is the realm of symbols,
dreams, myths, visions, revelations, and mysteries. It is not a world made up of ideas,
but of sensory perceptions, where things are seen, heard, touched, tasted, and smelled,
in the same sense that you can see, hear, and touch things in your dreams (Corbin 1994,
p. 70). You cannot use your ordinary sight or true sight, though, you have to use your
creative imagination, going back to the three types of seeing I talked about earlier.

Some scholars of Sufism describe the intermediate world like this:

The mundus imaginalis [or imaginal world] is the realm where invisible realities
become visible, and corporeal things are spiritualized.
(Chittick 1989, p. ix)

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 13
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

The imagination, magical intermediary between thought and being, incarnation of

thought in image, and presence of the image in being.
(Koyré 1955, p. 60)

[The beings created by Active Imagination] subsist with an independent existence

[of their own type] in the intermediate world.
(Corbin 1969, p. 183)

Corbin uses the term “imaginal world” to avoid the connotations of the word
“imaginary,” which would make you think of an unreal fantasy world. After all, not
everything you imagine has the same level of reality. If I tell myself to think of
something really weird, I might imagine a hamburger with wings, but that is just a
fantasy, it is not part of the imaginal world. Similarly, if I tell myself to imagine a purple
elephant, that is not part of the imaginal world either. Since those are “premeditated or
provoked by a conscious process of the mind” (Corbin 1969. p. 220): Corbin would say
they are just on the plane of what he calls “Conjoined Imagination,” rather than on the
higher plane of the imaginal world.

On the other hand, when things you imagine “come to the mind spontaneously like
dreams (or daydreams)” (Corbin 1969, p.220), those things are in the imaginal world.
When you see something with creative imagination, it is somewhat like a dream, vision,
or reverie, you are seeing something from the imaginal world. And so, when someone
sees an abstract photograph and asks, “Well what IS it?”, my response is that the
photograph is not only a tree: it is a bridge to the imaginal world; it is a combination of
matter and spirit.

While Jungians are generally pretty receptive to the idea that the psychoid and the
imaginal world are in some sense real, it is a hard notion for many modern Westerners
to accept. We are used to solid things that we can see and touch being real, like chairs
and trees and mountains, while the things we imagine or see in dreams are totally
different. But just because they are different does not mean they are not real. After all,
we believe that many things are real even though they cannot be seen with the naked
eye, like infrared light or the God particle. As long as you can detect it somehow or see it
have an effect on something, then you believe it is real. Sometimes you just need a
different tool to help you see it, like to see infrared light you will need infrared goggles,
or to find the God particle you will need your friendly neighborhood large hadron
collider. It is the same thing with the psychoid and the imaginal world - we cannot see
them with our ordinary sight, but we can see them with creative imagination, which we
can all do in our dreams and reveries. Since we can see it, and it definitely has an effect
on us, we might as well accept that the imaginal world is real. When I first heard of
imagination as creating something real, and connecting with the in-between world of
dreams, symbols and visions, it immediately resonated with me, and helped me
understand better what I was doing with my abstract photographs, and helped me value
the imaginal world just as much as the physical world around us. However, for people
who still do not believe that the imaginal world is real, I would encourage them to just
think of it as a metaphor - as long as we value imagination and our dialogue with the
unconscious, that is the most important thing.

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 14
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Now, going back to what the imaginal world is, I talked about how it is a marriage or
coniunctio of the inner and outer worlds. So, the things in that world are also a mixture
of spirit and matter, and some may have a larger amount of one world in them than of
the other one:

The soul’s ‘storehouse of imagination’ is full of images derived from both the
outward and the inward worlds. Each image is a mixture of subtlety and density,
luminosity and darkness, clarity and murkiness.
(Chittick 1994 p. 72)

This goes back to the theme of the psyche and the city, or the psyche and our
surroundings in general. Photographs are always a combination of the two, and some
draw more from the surroundings while others draw more from the psyche. Ones that
draw more from the surroundings are more representational, while ones that draw more
from the psyche are more abstract.

For example, Memoria #8 has more of the external world in it, and more closely
resembles outer reality (Fig. 38), while Memoria #19 on the other hand has more of the
inner world, more closely resembling some inner reality rather than the actual trees I
was photographing (Fig. 39). This photograph is particularly interesting to me, because
I was actually photographing two thin trees next to each other, but from how I rotated
the camera between each of the multiple exposures, the image ended up forming this
dark concentration of energy, like a nest or a gnarled ball. It was really a co-creation
between the trees and me, a combination of us, which neither of us could have done
alone. In fact, when seeing the image in the camera, the energy was so powerful that I
felt as if I had seen an eclipse of the sun; I could not look at it too long without becoming
overwhelmed by its intensity. From this example, you can see that the imaginal world
can come from various sources- not just from your own subconscious, but sometimes
from a deeper source, whether you call it a muse, the Self, or God. Moments of
conjunction with the imaginal world cannot be predicted; we can only wait with
openness to its inspiration.

Fig. 38 Fig. 39

Before I move on from this series of photographs, I should mention that I am

simplifying the philosophy of Sufism in various ways, because it is really complicated

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 15
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

with many subtle distinctions and various invisible worlds. For example, I am only
concentrating on two of the five worlds that they identify, our ordinary sensory world,
and the imaginal world, and am not really talking about the world of conjoined
imagination, the world of spirits or the divine world because my photography is focused
on trying to show the imaginal world.

As I worked more with photographs of trees, I began to be drawn to images that are
even more abstract, more part of my inner world, and that led to my latest series of
photographs which I call Multiple Visions. These works (figs. 40, 41, 42) follow a
generally similar process of building up multiple exposures of trees, but they are in
color, obviously, and I let the branches break down even further, almost into an all-over
pattern or color field, while still keeping some signs of the original structure of the trees.

Fig. 40 Fig. 41 Fig. 42

These images move onward from the winter of the Memoria series, and show the life
bursting forth in other seasons, like the delicate blossoms of springtime (Figs. 43, 44,
45). As I worked on co-creating these photographs, I was very aware of all the life being
co-created around me, between the constant buzzing of bees and the heady sweetness of
the flowers. Even though you cannot see the bees in the photographs, I hope some
feeling comes through of abundant life.

Fig. 43 Fig. 44 Fig. 45

Other photographs try to show the feeling of wonder I have when I look up at the
dazzling kaleidoscope of a canopy of summer leaves overhead (Figs. 46, 47, 48). The

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 16
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

dappled light in between the leaves, a thousand colors of green… By the way, the name
Multiple Visions came to me as a way of combining together the photographic technique
of multiple exposures, plus the multiple ways of seeing that I have talked about here,
and of the visions that may be revealed in the imaginal world.

Fig. 46 Fig. 47 Fig. 48

Active Imagination
As you have probably noticed, like many artists I tend to work in series of related
images. It lets me concentrate on specific subject matter for an extended period of time,
so I can interact with the subject more deeply and really get to know it. One way that
analytical psychology has been helpful to me as an artist has been to think of working
on a series as a form of active imagination in the Jungian sense, that is, as a meditation
technique where you engage in a dialogue with figures from your unconscious. That
dialogue happens in the imaginal world or psychoid, creating a bridge between your ego
and the unconscious.

In my photography, one example of my process of active imagination is a series called

Writing the Divine, which is the last series I would like to show (Figs. 49, 50, 51).

Fig. 49 Fig. 50 Fig. 51

Before I started work on this series, I was happily working on some other images, when
suddenly I had the idea to do close-up photographs of writing, something I had never
photographed before. I was intrigued, but did not know how it would work, or what it
would end up looking like. Still, I embraced the unknown, engaged in a dialogue with it,

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 17
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

and tried to just see where it would lead. After a number of attempts and changes in
direction, the process of creative imagination led me deeper into the imaginal world.
Since I am a thinking type, it was at times difficult to use an intuitive approach, but I am
glad I stuck with it. After all, the mysteries of the imaginal world are far richer than any
images the rational intellect could put together.

In this series, I took various phrases related to spirituality, things that were deeply
meaningful to me in one way or another, and wrote them over and over again on
translucent sheets of paper. I stacked the sheets on top of one another, and
photographed them so you could see the layers showing through, as in this photograph
where you can see a close-up of the letter “O” written a number of times, with other
lighter layers showing through behind it. Writing the phrases over and over by hand was
a very meditative process, and let me really concentrate on the meaning of the phrases,
which I chose for their relevance to what I was experiencing at the time. In the Present,
for example, I show part of the Buddhist phrase, “Form is emptiness; emptiness is form”
(Fig. 50). Batter my Heart is from John Donne’s Holy Sonnet (Fig. 52). Each
photograph intentionally shows only a small part of the writing, so you cannot always
make out individual letters, much less what the whole phrase says. Plus, some of the
phrases are in other languages that I speak like Russian, so there may be even less
chance of literal legibility in those cases.

The series is basically a meditation on how to express the inexpressible. I can say
something about God or spirituality to someone, but that does not mean that they will
understand it. Over the centuries as teachings get passed down from person to person,
layers get built up of interpretation, reinterpretation, and misinterpretation. In the same
way, in these photographs each layer builds upon what came before, adding to it but also
partially obscuring it, like a manuscript that has been written on again and again, a
palimpsest.

Fig. 52 Fig. 53 Fig. 54

As Karen Armstrong says in her book The Case for God (year), the divine cannot be
understood through reason and language. We need to try to understand by moving
beyond that into the space beyond words. While even the most complex words are not
expressive enough to describe God, on the other hand even the simplest word is full of
so much meaning, as in Fig. 53.

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 18
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

While this series has a lot in common with my previous series, in terms of composition,
rhythm, and tonality, it is the farthest I have gone in representing the inner world
through photographs. So in a sense, they are my most abstract images, though they still
have some connection to the external world through my handwriting. Writing, and
words in general, are sometimes seen as belonging to the imaginal world in that they are
an intermediary carrying ideas back and forth between the external and internal worlds.
. We sometimes think of words as hard-and-fast, well-defined concepts, but given how
often misunderstandings occur, and how words fail to describe the ineffable, I think of
words as shimmering silver fish swimming in a river. You can try to follow them for a
while as they perhaps point the way, but at some point you will lose sight of them, and
you will need to just jump in, and see where the river takes you.

Fig. 55 Fig. 56 Fig. 57

Conclusion
In conclusion, I have talked about how abstract photographs serve as bridges that
connect the ordinary world with the imaginal world. Like all photographs, they are
necessarily tied to the ordinary world around us, while abstraction helps bring in the
mysterious qualities of the imaginal world, and creates a coniunctio of matter and spirit.
I would like to emphasize the importance of different ways of seeing, and the reality of
the imaginal world, are common to all types of art. There are many different ways to
show the realities of the imaginal world, not just in photography, but also with painting,
sculpture, storytelling, dance, or any art form. However you want to do it, the most
important things are to follow your creative imagination, and let your psyche mix with
the city, or whatever your surroundings are.

Lifting the veils so that we can truly see things in this world, or use creative imagination
to catch glimpses of the mysterious imaginal world, we have a responsibility to share our
experiences. That is true whether you are an artist, an analyst, or whomever. Like
shamans, we all need to try to bring more consciousness into this world by building
bridges to the imaginal world.

© Ryan Bush 2012. All rights reserved, may not be reproduced or distributed without written permission. 19
ARAS Connections Issue 3, 2014

Endnotes
Adams, Ansel, and Mary Street Alinder. An Autobiography, New York, 1996.
Adams, Tessa, and Andrea Duncan. The Feminine Case: Jung, Aesthetics and Creative
Process, London, 2003.
Albers, Josef. Arts/Canada, Vol. 23, 1966.
Armstrong, Karen. The Case for God, New York, 2009.
Cheetham, Tom. Green Man, Earth Angel: The Prophetic Tradition and the Battle for
the Soul of the World, Albany, 2005.
Chittick, William. The Sufi Path of Knowledge, Albany, 1989.
Chittick, William. The Self-Disclosure of God: Principles of Ibn al-‘Arabī’s Cosmology,
Albany, 1998.
Chittick, William. Imaginal Worlds: Ibn al-‘Arabī and the Problem of Religious
Diversity, Albany, 1994.
Corbin, Henry, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sūfism of Ibn ‘Arabī,
Princeton, 1969.
Design & Art Magazine. “Sculptor Constantin Brancusi's Atelier in Paris at the
Pompidou”. Available at http://www.designartmagazine.com/2013/03/sculptor-
constantin-brancusis-atelier.html (accessed September 7, 2014).
Edschmid, Kasimir. Schöpferische Konfession. Berlin, 1920
Jung, Carl Gustav., Collected Works, Vol. 12: Psychology and Alchemy, 2nd ed.,
Princeton: 1968, Para 400.
Koyré Alexandre. Mystiques, Spirituels, Alchimistes du XVIe siécle allemand. Paris,
1955.
Mann, Mary Pat, “The Door to the Imaginal Realm”. Mytholog, vol. 4 #3, 2006.
Available at http://www.mytholog.com/essays/mann_imaginalrealm.html
(accessed September 7, 2014)
Rossi, Kaye, Synchronicity and Hitting-bottom: A Jungian Perspective on the Return
of the Feminine Through Addiction and Recovery, Ann Arbor, 2004.
Samuels, Andrew, Bani Shorter, and Alfred Plaut. A Critical Dictionary of Jungian
Analysis, New York, 1986.
Schipperges, Heinrich. Hildegard of Bingen: Healing and the Nature of the Cosmos.
New Jersey, 1997.

WWW.RYANBUSHPHOTOGRAPHY.COM 20