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Inner Light: The Shaker Legacy
Photography. Fifty-eight photographs by Linda Butler and a superb text by June Sprigg, author of By Shaker Hands, reveal and pay tribute to the elegance of line, the magnificent craftsmanship, the realms of stillness and light, the vision and spiritual serenity that are the Shaker legacy. The photographs range in subject from a bonnet in an oval box to a spiral staircase, a laundry room, a songbook, a cupboard, a washstand, and a cupola. In them, the quality and play of light--light endlessly altering the look of places and things--expresses the sustaining harmony and grace of the Shaker way of being. "(Butler's) exquisitely composed studies of stairways, windows, furniture, houses and field convey with loving regard and exactitude their subjects' `inner light'"--Publishers Weekly.
100 pages, Paperback
First published April 12, 1985
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April 16, 2020
There is a quiet, simple elegance to these pictures that nicely complements the Shaker life that Butler describes in her introductory note. Graceful lines and forms in these photos are accented by soft, overflowing light and crisp shadows. There are no people in these pictures, which, in a way I suppose, reflect the largely now died-out Shaker communities. Not only does Butler have a poetic eye, but there are no pompous wording about her photos or "work." It's all just straightforward language, the content of which speaks, artfully, for itself.*
*"It is remarkable that the Shakers, a religious sect that was at its height over a century ago, can still speak so eloquently to the contemporary world. There is something in the vision of these people that stops us - the pace and complexity of our daily lives exist outside their doors, and for a short time there is a respite.
"My reaction was first and foremost an aesthetic one. Some aspect of an object or architectural space would speak to me, and I would attempt to pull out of it what I saw or felt.
"In all but two communities, there are no living Shakers. Yet how strongly these people speak in the things they left behind! The buildings have an undeniably spiritual quality, and, a century and a half after they were built, they show evidence of a clarity of mind and vision. They were designed to evoke the spirit of God, and they do. There is a quietness in these simple lines and stark surroundings that facilitates a focus beyond oneself.
"So, too, there is a relentless perfection in many of the Shaker objects. In a cloak, each stitch is exactly in place. The lid of an oval box is neither too loose nor too tight."
*"It is remarkable that the Shakers, a religious sect that was at its height over a century ago, can still speak so eloquently to the contemporary world. There is something in the vision of these people that stops us - the pace and complexity of our daily lives exist outside their doors, and for a short time there is a respite.
"My reaction was first and foremost an aesthetic one. Some aspect of an object or architectural space would speak to me, and I would attempt to pull out of it what I saw or felt.
"In all but two communities, there are no living Shakers. Yet how strongly these people speak in the things they left behind! The buildings have an undeniably spiritual quality, and, a century and a half after they were built, they show evidence of a clarity of mind and vision. They were designed to evoke the spirit of God, and they do. There is a quietness in these simple lines and stark surroundings that facilitates a focus beyond oneself.
"So, too, there is a relentless perfection in many of the Shaker objects. In a cloak, each stitch is exactly in place. The lid of an oval box is neither too loose nor too tight."
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