Mt. Meru in the Kali-Yuga
1993
Morris Graves
born Fox Valley, Oregon, 1910; died Loleta, California, 2001
Mt. Meru in the Kali-Yuga has in it an ominous polluted sky, a stealth bomber flying through the composition, a periscope from a nuclear submarine, a blotted-out sun. Mt. Meru, the mythological abode of the gods that personify wisdom rises up in the center of the painting.
In the ocean of consciousness there are certain forms that are more eternal, more enduring than others. The Kali-Yuga, the iron age, the age of dissention as the Hindu would call it, is rife with ideologies and instruments that tend to divide people and places and polarize the pair of opposites in confusing ways. Even Mt. Meru is eroding and wisdom is clouded and accessibility is not so easy.
Acrylic on paper
Overall: 38 × 26in. (96.5 × 66cm)
Frame: 31 1/8 × 45in. (79.1 × 114.3cm)
Gift of Robert Yarber
94.156