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In The Night of 13 October 1942

Dreamed 1942/10/13, painted Sept. 1975 by Peter Birkhauser

Birkhäuser dreamed on the 13th of October 1942, that with his wife he was climbing a steep, narrow ramp within the tower of Basel cathedral. A miraculous being, half fish and half insect, climbed up beside the ramp on two threads. At the top it turned into a fish’s head, shining silvery in every colour. From its mouth emanated a blue light. Courageously, Sibylle stood still, the fish approached her as if to kiss her and she became completely illumined by the blue light.

Peter went on and had to jump from one platform to another over the abyss. From the opposite platform, an eye, the eye of God, was looking at him from a green triangle. It penetrated him with its overwhelming light.

This dream vision is the experience of ‘vocation’. The anima is inspired and illumined before the artist himself.

'In The Night of 13 October 1942', dream painting by Peter Birkhauser.

SOURCE: Light from the Darkness: the Paintings of Peter Birkhauser, (1980), p.80-1; commentary by his therapist Marie-Louise von Franz.

EDITOR'S NOTE

Birkhauser started as a realist, but became a dream artist--and a friend of Jung's. Both Peter and Sybille went into Jungian analysis; this dream was maybe a year into therapy.

My take here is simpler than Franz's. Sybille is Sybille, not some anima figure; she bravely accepts the kiss of a monster guarding the spire. Peter makes a scary leap and thus earns his own initiation, if from a more conventional God. The dream says their challenges differ in detail, but they're climbing to new spiritual heights together. Dreamwork is working.

--Chris Wayan


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