News & Event

May 12th, MOTHER’S DAY 3 P.M. – Recitation Milton’s Paradise Lost & on piano THE SATANIC RHAPSODY

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135 Broadway, Brooklyn, NY 11211

http://www.wahcenter.net/

(718) 486-6012

May 8th, MOTHER’S DAY 3 P.M.

Admission $5

TERRANCE LINDALL, renowned illustrator and scholar,

recites passages from

JOHN MILTON’S PARADISE LOST

Free copy of his full color Paradise Lost Broadside!

https://sites.google.com/site/terrancelindallsparadiselost/home

Also:

Master Surrealist Bienvenido Bones Banez Jr. will play his SATANIC RHAPSODY on our grand piano

Thrilling…gives you goosebumps!” Audience Member

http://www.welcomebones666artworld.trilogistick.com/  

Special exhibit

On display: the luxury hand embellished Paradise Lost 13 x 19 inch Elephant folio –  fully illustrated and HAND EMBELLISHED by Terrance Lindall, with commentary by the foremost collector of Milton books and illustrations, Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser. The folio was produced on Museo paper with 1000 dpi 6 color printing, appointed with  23.75 CARAT GOLD LEAF, the most superlative techniques and materials available to our age!

Commentary by Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser:

Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser’s Commentary for the Elephant Folio

Terrance Lindall’s Press Release

Epics have been around with us from the beginning of recorded history. They usually involve heroes of prodigious courage and abilities who overcome impossible odds. Sometimes they are tragic characters, as is the case with Satan in Milton’s Paradise Lost. Satan’s fall springs out of his own love of God and a desire to be loved…the desire of a son to be loved by his father. He was once the foremost of God’s archangels and commanded the legions, until one day God announced that there would be another to take Satan’s place as second to God.

 Satan, with envy against the Son of God, could not bear through pride that sight and thought himself impaired. Deep malice thence conceiving, he resolved with all hs legions to dislodge the Throne Supreme Raphael in Milton’s Paradise Lost

The question arises, was it a desire for love, or was it merely damaged pride that caused the fall from Grace. It could be either. It will be for you to determine. Reasoning out the proof of Satan’s ultimate nature as depicted by Milton is a task which has enthralled scholars for hundreds of years!

What epics reveal to us are heroic figures who often bear traits which we ourselves possess, sometimes noble, sometimes flawed…in this tragic case, traits of envy or jealousy, overweening pride, ambition, a desire for love, in the case of Satan, not only love from God but from the multitudes of Heaven itself…You might say he wanted to be the ultimate “Rock Star.” And further, Satan before the fall is a creature of absolute unparalleled beauty, a supreme mind, yet whose reasoning powers are corrupted by envy and anger to that point in which he undertakes what by definition is an impossible task, a mighty task… to overthrow the Monarchy of God Himself, and in the process inventing the cannon. One thinks that on a smaller scale we as mortal humans must also set a an impossible task for ourselves which is to live life with fullest heart, using all of the gifts that God has given, and yet knowing that we, for all we achieve, must die to the world.

Satan is not without redeeming virtues even as he wages war against God. Knowing that he must undertake the ignoble act of corrupting Adam and Eve, God’s new and most beauteous creatures in a New Paradise, he yet waivers at the thought when he first views them…beauteous in the midst of the splendor of the garden:

Oh Hell, what do mine eyes with grief behold! Ah, gentle pair, ye little think how nigh your change approaches, when all these delights will vanish and deliver ye to woe…And should I at your harmless innocence melt, as I do, yet reason, honor and empire with revenge compels me now to do what I should abhor! Satan when he arrives in Paradise

So Satan still retains aspects of angelic nobility (by mortal standards), though he is compelled by his own free will and determination to destroy what is Good in the name of a Deed which he has determined to do as necessary for the greater good of achieving a conquest for the multitudes of now fallen angels he now leads. Here the end justifies the means. It leads to the question of what is good in any absolute sense of the concept. We all know that if Satan were to reason it out, he would yield to the Justice of God and ask forgiveness, but that thing again called pride prevents that. And yet we can admire Satan in that determination, that unbendable will, he possesses. Should we possess that will, there is nothing we could not achieve on earth. It is akin to the will of Adolph Hitler or Osama Bin Laden to sacrifice all for a cause, and even if the cause is flawed, to continue nonetheless, because of pride, an unwillingness to admit the weakness of having been wrong. A greater being would sacrifice pride, but Satan’s angelic reasoning has been corrupted.

Other aspects of Lindall’s yearly presentation of his adaptation of Paradise Lost is his interest in one of the most famous phrases in Milton’s epic when Satan declares …the mind is it’s own place and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. It has long been the contention of Lindall, as well as many philosophers throughout history, that there is no distinction between mind and matter, or phenomenal and noumenal reality. The proof was most clearly stated by George Berkeley in the dictum esse est percipi… To be is to be perceived. In other words, everything is perception. In modern physics, the old notion of a Newtonian billiard ball cosmos has given way to notions of subatomic particles like quarks and charmed particles, thence to the notion that at some point there are only events. That idea delights Lindall who says that physics will ultimately prove his own judgment about the nature of reality. Whether events are predictable is the goal of science. The ontogeny and ontology of the transpiring reality is the realm of philosophy. Essentially the best scientists and mathematicians are philosophers, like John Locke, Liebnitz, Newton and Einstein.

*For a complete discussion of Lindall’s theories, go to “Lindall’s Essay on Epistemological Art”

Terrance Lindall’s surreal/visionary art has graced the covers of numerous books and magazines and has been exhibited at many galleries and museums over the past 30 years. Here are some of the things that have been said of his art”It is nice to know there is a latter day Bosch around”– Dr. Leo Steinberg, Art Critic¨”Terrance Lindall’s fanciful illustrations are bound to arouse response & provoke thought in the may persons interested in PARADISE LOST & its subjects & in surreal illustration generally” ¨–Professor Thomas Clayton, University of Minnesota Department of English¨” Clearly avoiding the view that Pop imagery is inherently a sign of trauma, Terry Lindall employs the cartoon elements of style with a charming and often unnerving directness and simplicity, frequently aimed at causing a trauma all his own. This is particularly the case with his illustrations of Milton’s Paradise Lost, with which he reaches a hyper-intensified and nearly hysterical verve. ” ¨–Mark Daniel Cohen, Critic for Review Magazine and NY Arts Magazine¨” The high water mark in the Golden Age of this uniquely American Art form..” ¨–James Kalm, NY Arts Magazine¨” Surreal nightmare…DNA seems to have gone berserk” ¨–The New York Art World Magazine Nov. 1999¨” …since I was a teenager back in 1982… I’ve considered Terrance Lindall one of the globe’s greatest artists. My particular favorite is his intense adaptation of PARADISE LOST, which never fails to instill a pervasive dread in my mind.”¨– Greg Fasolino 1997, “Natural insanity” Art Alternative Magazine 1996¨” …eerie, magical, dreamlike, devastating, jarring…Lindall’s illustrative style is magnificent!” ¨– Julie Simmons, Editor in Chief, Heavy Metal Magazine 1980¨” Lindall’s use of color & detail to acheive effect, his dramatic compositions, but most of all his totally unique vision make him a new wave artist to be reckoned with.”¨– Louise Jones, Senior Editor, Warren Communications 1980¨” Lindall’s striking and unique visionary fantasy art is breaking new ground in the field”¨–David Hartwell, Senior Editor POCKET BOOKS, Simon & Schuster 1980¨” My reward for the purchase of a Lindall masterwork has been a cover that draws raves. It is a very valuable addition to my collection of fine art.”¨– Stuart David Schiff, twice winner of the World Fantasy Award & editor of the acclaimed WHISPERS anthologies¨¨The magazines CREEPY, EERIE, VAMPIRELLA, HEAVY METAL AND MARVEL’S EPIC, and Rod Serling’s TWILIGHT ZONE, for which he produced some of the most dazzling art of an era, are now highly sought after collectibles. The work he did for these magazines is part of the history of an important American art form which has influenced many young persons and would-be artists growing up in America and around the world.

Apart from being an artist, Terrance Lindall has a background in philosophy and has been active in the intellectual realms of the Williamsburg Brooklyn art community over the past few years. His recent essay THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL MOVEMENT IN THE ARTS (assesses the new artistic trends in the contemporary art world and it’s context in new thinking about fractal geometry, quantum mechanics, historical will, and epistemological and analytic traditions. His show APOCALYPSE 1999 was the most lavish art production seen in Williamsburg to date with over 125 artists from around the world and incorporating many provocative musical and theatrical productions. In SEPTEMBER 2003 Terrance Lindall produced BRAVE DESTINY, the largest gathering of living surreal/visionay artists from around the world with a Grand Surrealist Ball! wahcenter.net/exhibits/2003/surreal/

In 2008 Terrance produced the world’s largest ever Milton festival, which was covede by a major article in the New York Times and major papers around the  world.

Terrance Lindall is also a builder of institutions such as the Greenwood Museum in upper New York State, and has worked with Yuko Nii in developing the Williamsburg Art & Historical Center which has achieved international recognition