In Celebration Of Cecil Collins: Art, Spirituality, and Creative Joy

Cecil Collins is an artist I have a great appreciation for. This book documents the thoughts and reflections of many of those who knew him, whether as a collector, curator, student of his unique teaching methods, or through other connections.

Collins’ work carries a particular quality that is difficult to define, yet unmistakable when encountered. It speaks from a place that feels both ancient and immediate, personal and universal.

Images arise from the fountainhead of human life—the heart, the solar centre from ancient memories in the blood, and from the polarity and fire of the spirit.

If you find yourself drawn to this way of approaching images, you are welcome to explore my own artwork on the site, where similar themes of presence, symbolism, and landscape unfold in a different form.

Art as Praise And Wonder

The purpose of Art is to worship and praise life through wonder and magic.

Art, in this sense, is not primarily expressive, conceptual, or critical, but is devotional in nature. It arises from a relationship to life that is grounded in wonder, and in a sensitivity to what might be called the spiritual dimension of experience.

This places his work slightly outside many contemporary frameworks, where art is often expected to explain, interrogate, or position itself within discourse.

This way of understanding art can feel unfamiliar. It moves away from thinking of art as something to be evaluated, explained, or positioned, and instead toward something more participatory. Wonder is not something we analyse from a distance, but something we enter into. In this sense, the image is not asking to be decoded so much as encountered.

An Overlooked Visionary

I feel Collins has been somewhat overlooked, and with the recent resurgence of interest in the spiritual in British art, I would like to see greater recognition of his work in this context.

That said, he was no occultist, and that is more the current flavour of interest within the contemporary art world. Perhaps he falls between categories because his spirituality is less easily defined, quieter, and more inwardly grounded.

This ambiguity may be part of both his difficulty and his importance. In this sense, his work resists both categorisation and trend, which may be precisely what allows it to endure.

Encountering The Work

Around six years ago there were a number of his paintings on display in the Tate Britain, in the room dedicated to William Blake. In the flesh they are truly Numinous, really singing from the canvas.

Another Collins work I have encountered is in Chichester Cathedral, Sussex — Icon Of Divine Light. This altarpiece, situated in St.Clement's Chapel, is a permanent feature, and a very moving presence.

These encounters make something clear that reproduction cannot fully convey: the sense that the image is not merely depicting something, but holding a presence. There is a stillness to them, but not an emptiness, which creates a sense of invitation, that the pictures is completed by its viewer.

Teaching Creativity and Resistance

He valued creativity and art education very highly, but was often dismayed by how constrained it could become within academic institutions. He was frequently at loggerheads with those who questioned or disregarded his outlook.

In response, he developed his own teaching methods for his always popular classes, often involving music and movement. These were not conventional art lessons, but attempts to reconnect creativity with a more vital, embodied source.

Not work, not sorrow, not knowledge, not wisdom, success or failure, not victory, not truth, but creative joy is the God of life, and until we desire that god, He will not appear.

This idea of creative joy feels central. Not productivity, not achievement, but a kind of living participation. What he seemed to be protecting, above all, was the possibility that creativity might remain connected to something vital and inward, rather than becoming purely technical or externally directed.

A Living Presence in Art

What remains most striking to me is the sense that Collins’ work is not simply symbolic or illustrative, but alive in some way.

This is difficult to define without reducing it, but it is recognisable in direct experience. Certain images seem to carry a presence that exceeds their materials. They are not only about something, but feel as though they are something. Not in a literal sense, but in the quality of attention they hold, and the response they evoke.

This way of encountering an image asks something different of the viewer. Not just interpretation, but a kind of participation. A willingness to stay with the image, rather than moving too quickly to explain it.

It is also something that connects closely with depth psychology, where images, whether in dreams, imagination, or art, are approached as meaningful in themselves, rather than as puzzles to be solved. If you are interested in how this relates more broadly, I have written more about this in relation to depth psychotherapy and the role of images within it.

In my own work, I find I am often moving toward this same question. Not how to represent something, but how an image might come to carry a sense of life or presence. This is usually when I feel a work is approaching completion, when it begins to hold something of its own.

In this sense, the image is not simply an outcome, but part of an ongoing relationship. Something encountered, rather than fully known.

All quotations are from 'Cecil Collins - The Vision of the Fool and Other Writings'.

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Thank you for reading this article. If Collins’ work, or the themes of art and presence explored here, resonate with you, you are very welcome to explore more of my own artwork on the site.

My painting and mixed-media work engages with landscape, symbolism, and the Numinous, often with a similar concern for the image as something living rather than purely representational.

I also offer online mentoring for artists and creative practitioners, creating space for reflection on creative process, direction, and the deeper questions that often accompany artistic work.

If you are interested in psychotherapy, you can find out more about sessions online in the UK and how we might begin working together. My approach is informed by depth psychology, and includes attention to image, imagination, and meaning.