Dean Bakopoulos – Hold on Loosely: The Spiritual Practice of Craft (January 2025)

In this lecture, we will examine the mysticism behind the making (craft) of what we make (art). We will consider the Book of Revelation as a grief narrative. We will wrestle with Jung’s concept of the human shadow as a means of entering our work. We will explore the art of ritual, and how it appears in our stories and poems. We will ponder our burning need for closure before The Ultimate Closure. We will interrogate our resistance to detachment.  We will disparage the teachings of the desert fathers, mock the failings of the Stoic philosophers, and bolster our own egos even as we dissolve them, ideally while dancing to the sweet sounds of yacht rock.