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horti musa inspirare: be inspired by the garden Muse

horti musa inspirare

“Be inspired by the garden Muse“ larkspur

Fr Abbot, Dom Peter Burns, Dom James Leachman and Dom Alexander Bevan joined Dom Daniel McCarthy of Atchison in a visit to Keizersberg Abbey in Leuven (21-25 June 2014). They wanted to promote links between Ealing Abbey, Keizersberg Abbey, St Benedict’s Atchison and the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven in different ways.

They were inspired by two pieces of arts collaboration recently commissioned by Abbot Kris Op de Beeck and the monks of Keizersberg. The enormous undertaking was directed  by the prior, Dirk Hanssens. Prior Dirk gave the visitors from Ealing and Atchison an inspiring digital display of a work on Abbess Hildegard of Bingen, “Sci vias Dei” (Know the ways of God) and of a performance In Pace Frivola, Sebastiaan van Steenberge.

horti musa inspirare – Abbess Hildegarde of Bingen

Voice of the Living Light  Unknown-2

horti musa inspirare – performative arts

Link to Musa horti in Belgium

horti musa inspirare – figurative and visual arts

For the past year we have been considering how to enhance the experience of monks and visitors to our gardens. Paintings in gardens can inhabit ambivalence, ‘visual haikus’, suspended between abstraction and figuration.

Garden as art: The garden is exceptional at capturing the essence of the seasons. Freshly dug earth transforms to summer flower-filled borders, seedpods, petals, leaves, stems and bark are captured in all their glorious colour and myriad patterns.

Art can combine the depiction of flora with an element of topography to reflect the layout of the gardens, and a backcloth of distinctive sandstone walls. Flora and the arts can celebrate nature and the miracle of its unending beauty.

Today, people of all ages and backgrounds use the different monastery gardens in different ways.

Finally many gardeners come to our Abbey gardens to seek inspiration. In the beds and borders throughout the garden you may find new plants that would be perfect in your garden at home. We are striving to label every plant in the abbey gardens clearly and accurately.

© Ealing Abbey, copyright, 26 June 2014