Meditation on Visualization

Make time for your mental health, and enjoy our new meditation on thoughts inspired by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner’s The Lighthouse of Fehmarn.

Step-by-Step Meditation

1. Look at this painting and notice how it makes you feel upon first glance.
2. Now slow down and take in all the vibrant colors. Consider the artist’s feelings and sensations surrounding this place. What do you think the expressionist artist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner was trying to communicate through his usage of lines and colors?
3. Close your eyes and let the image from the painting dissolve away.
4. Start to imagine a place that is special to you – a place where you have been numerous times that you can recall in detail.
5. How does this place make you feel? What colors do you associate with this feeling?
6. Visualize this place from your memory and imagine you are filling the landscape up with the colors associated with your feelings and sensations surrounding this place.
7. Focus on the various colors to connect with your emotions and center your mind.

This work is on view in Scaife Gallery 8.

Image: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, German, 1880–1938; The Lighthouse of Fehmarn, c. 1912; oil on canvas, Work 47 1/16 × 35 13/16 in 119.54 × 90.96 cm Frame 54 ¾ × 43 3/16 × 2 ⅜ in 139.06 × 109.70 × 6.03 cm, Patrons Art Fund, 55.56, Public Domain.