BEAUTY: NICHOLAS ROERICH'S VISION FOR THE FUTURE

Ruth Abrams Drayer

In 1946, the Youth's Art and Culture Circle of Bombay, India, published a slim volume written by the
Russian artist Nicholas K. Roerich titled Beautiful Unity. To have been published in 1946, it would
have had to been written earlier. Therefore, to place this book in the context of the times, Professor
Roerich was 72 years old; it was one year before his death in 1947. He and his dear wife Helena
Roerich, were living in Kulu Vally, India, with the Himalayan Range just outside their window.

Their Central Asian Expedition had been completed in 1928 and he and his son George had returned
from the second expedition into the Gobi in 1937. World War II had ended in 1945. Europe was in
ruins. Roerich's much loved India was in turmoil. Mahatma Gandhi was being thrown in jail for
preaching non-violence. Roerich's dear motherland, the Soviet Union, was in severe conflict with the
Allies and Berlin was soon to become a cold war hot spot. Professor Roerich and his younger son
Svetoslav, (also an artist) arranged exhibitions and sold paintings and sent the profits to the Red Cross
on the Russian front. In effort to preserve the world's culture from further destruction, Roerich worked
to establish the American-Russian Cultural Association and to acquaint people with the goals of the
Roerich Pact of Peace and the Banner of Peace and Culture.

He had conceived the idea of preserving the world's artistic and scientific achievements originally in
1904 and proposed it to the Russian Society of Architects. But now 40 years and two World Wars later,
after so much had been destroyed in Europe, he again rallied people with the necessity, saying: “The
care for art and knowledge on a planetary scale is our universal duty. The treasures of beauty belong to
the world.

“We introduced the Banner of Peace as a Red Cross of Culture to protect the real treasures of
humanity”, he wrote. “These treasures belong to the world. The care for art and knowledge is an
universal duty on a planetary scale. If anyone possessed a receptacle containing a working solution for
a healthy world, how carefully would he guard that treasure. But Culture, Beauty and Science are that
same miracle-working formula and as such should require vigilant devotion. Just as people worry about
their health, the solution of beauty needs to be guarded and venerated. What an epoch-making day
might be before us when the Banner of Peace and Culture will be unfurled over all countries, all centers
of spirit, beauty and knowledge. This sign will call everyone to revere and value the treasures of human
greatness.”

Culture was sacred to Roerich. Not about personal refinement or social grace or intellectual excellence,
it meant a life of intensive creativeness on the spiritual front for the purpose of bringing forward a more
luminous and fruitful way for the establishment of permanent peace on earth. It stood for the sum total
of human creative abilities as found in the expression of the divine triad: beauty, truth and goodness.

“There where there is culture, is peace. There where there is peace, is culture. There where there are
difficult social problems, is achievement. Culture is the culmination of highest Bliss, of highest Beauty,
of highest knowledge.

“Our times are difficult because of all of the non-understanding and all attacks of darkness against
Light. But perhaps this terrible tension is the impulse to direct humanity through all storms and over all
abysses to peaceful construction and mutual respect. What an epoch-making day may be before us
when the one Banner of Peace and Culture will be unfurled over all countries, all centers of spirit,
beauty and knowledge. This sign would call everyone to revere the treasures of human genius, respect
culture and to have a new valuation of labor as the only measure of true values.”

He wrote: “Today we are striving toward the next evolution. We are trying to discard old forms and
create something new. But in order to attain the true enhancement of life we must honor the old. From
the heaving and conflicts of the old yesterdays, a new path of beauty and wisdom shall come. Great
beauty eventually follows earthquakes and floods, and the greatest cataclysms, so too will it follow this
world conflict. Be of good cheer. Amidst the ruins of human conventions, a new life already arises...one
in which art and knowledge will support the throne of Divine Love. Only Culture and Peace make
humans invincible and realizing all spiritual conditions they become tolerant and all-embracing.

“Let us imagine the history of humanity without the treasure of beauty. We would then readily realize
that the epochs felt meaningless. Soul-less. Without a manifestation of the spirit of the Beautiful, we
shall remain amid the ugliness of death. And when we proclaim that beauty, and art are life, we speak
of the coming evolution of beauty. Everything accomplished for art is an attainment for evolution.
Every co-worker in the field is already a hero or heroine.

“Sisters! Fearlessly stand on guard for the improvement of life. Kindle at each hearth a beautiful fire,
creative and inspiring. Speak the first word about beauty to the children. Teach them about the blessed
hierarchy of knowledge. Relate to them about creativeness. Guard them from dissolution and instill in
them the concepts of heroism and achievement. Teach the little ones about the primacy of cultural
values and pronounce the sacred word Culture. Great and beautiful is the work ordained for you.”

The gifts of art and beauty are timeless and deeply uplifting. Color is one of the ways consciousness is
raised. Artists have been the shamen, priests and healers throughout time. In the article titled, Mission
of Womanhood, (included in Roerich Pact, Peace Banner, The Red Cross of Culture. New World
Library. I.M.H. Press, Delhi, 1939) Roerich wrote, “From the most ancient of days, woman has worn a
wreath upon her head. With this wreath she is said to have pronounced the most sacred incantation. Is it
not the wreath of Unity? And is this not the highest responsibility and the most beautiful mission of
womanhood? From woman, one may learn that we must seek disarmament not in warships and guns
but in our spirits. When the hour of extreme need strikes, woman will stand and lift up her hand for the
salvation of the world. And encircled by all whirlwinds and all light, she will rise like a pillar of space,
summoning all the forces of the far-off worlds.

“The images of the Mother of the World, of the Madonna, the Mother Kali, the benevolent Dukkar,
Ishtar, Kwan-Yin, Miriam, the White Tara – all these great images, all these great self-sacrificing
beings merge together in one conception, as one benevolent Unity.

“Amongst the horrors, in the midst of the struggles and the collisions of the people, the question of
knowledge and the question of art are matters of the first importance. They are the only road to Peace.
Humanity has tried to lay hold of treasures which it has not deserved and so has torn the benevolent
veil of the goddess of happiness.

“The path of animosity, roughness and abuse will lead us nowhere. Away with darkness, away with
malice and treachery. Mankind has already felt enough of them. The only bases of life are art and
knowledge.
“Amidst ruins of valueless banknotes and the revaluation of values, mankind is realizing that no
occurrence is accidental. Knowing that the time for the construction of future culture is at hand,
humanity is facing the coming events of cosmic greatness. Modern life is filled with the animal
demands of the body. We come near to the line of the terrible magic circle and the only way of
conjuring its dark guardians and escaping from it is through the talisman of true knowledge and beauty.
The time is at hand when this will be a necessity.

“The History of Humanity gives innumerable examples of Art being the great Beacon of Light in times
of calamity. Scientists assert that colour and sound are a panacea. By Beauty and Harmony, even wild
beasts were tamed. The need of culture is especially felt in times of war and misunderstandings.

“The arts are one. The great synthesis. What is the creative spirit that inheres in all art but a breath from
the finer ethers of 'worlds before and after?' Music, painting, sculpture, poetry, the drama and dance –
in essence, these are one. They all spring from the same broadly creative spirit. They form the flower of
life. Their home is the the timeless and endless. “

Roerich believed that “To be in harmony with the increasing rate of life-vibration, we must make use of
the fast flying wings of imagination. In our effort to join the worlds within with the worlds without, we
are re-discovering the principle of unity as relating to all life. For the basis of true culture lies in the
perception of not only unity of the arts, but of unity between art and living. Seen as one, they become
an inexhaustible fountain of beauty.

“The artist is the priest of the beautiful. It is he who rescues the truth from ugliness and nourishes us
amidst the fret and stress of life. Like grains of sand, the beautiful is scattered throughout the universe.

“Throughout history, expressed in a multitude of ways, there are many convincing examples of people
who devoted themselves to Beauty: combining painting with architecture or sculpture or mosaics or the
graphic arts. Throughout time, artists lives have been difficult. Leonardo in Florence or Michaelangelo
in Rome experienced great hardships. No one will think the lives of Rembrandt or Rubens were easy.
However time adorns all sufferings with epic beatitude and calm. Yet how many tragedies remain
hidden behind the gorgeously brocaded curtains of Time.

“And the martyrs of science like Copernicus, Galileo, Paracelsus and innumerable other sufferers for
truth however, once we know that artists are the priests of the Beautiful, we also know that the
attainment of all other attributes is inevitable.

“The three basic remedies against human disease are colour, sound and fragrance. However, color does
not merely refer to paint, nor should music be understood as routine musical education in its narrow
sense.” Roerich used music in the broader sense of one of the greatest concepts of our existence.
Education of music is most important; Rhythm and Harmony are deeply rooted into the soul, dominate
it, fill it with beauty and transform man into a beautiful thinker. “In Athens, as service to the Muses, the
conception embraced not only the harmony of sound, but the whole domain of poetry, high perceptions,
exquisite forms and creation in general.

“Every librarian is a friend of the artist and scientist. The librarians is the first messenger of Beauty and
Knowledge. The one who opens the gates from the dead shelves and extracts the hidden word to
enlighten the searching mind. Not one catalog can replace a librarian. A loving word and experienced
hand may produce the miracle of enlightenment. But the true upliftment of knowledge comes in the
hour of silence and solitude when we concentrate all of our intelligences towards the truth.
“Real peace, real unity is desired by the human heart. It strives to labor creatively and actively for its
labor is a source of joy. It wants to love and expand in the realization of Sublime Beauty. In the highest
perception of Beauty and Knowledge all conventional divisions disappear. The heart speaks its own
language; it wants to rejoice that which is common for all, uplifts all, and leads to the radiant future. All
symbols and tablets of humanity contain one hieroglyph, the sacred prayer – Peace and Unity.

“The values of great art are victoriously traversing all storms of earthly commotions. And when we
proclaim love, beauty and action, we know that we pronounce the formula of the International
language. And this formula which belonged to the museum and stage is entering our everyday life. The
sign of beauty will open all sacred gates. Beneath the sign of beauty we walk joyfully. With beauty we
conquer. Through beauty we pray. In beauty we are united. Realizing the path of true reality, we affirm
these words amidst the turmoil of the city and we greet the future with a happy smile.

“People pray in moments of great difficulty. So too, is the prayer of the spirit most needed when one's
whole being is shaken and in need of support and when it seeks for a wise solution. And wherein lies a
stronger support? Prayer makes the spirit shine more brightly. You may say: Life is hard. How can we
think of knowledge and beauty if we nothing to live on? To this I say: You are right but you are also
wrong. Knowledge and art are not luxuries nor idleness. They are prayer and the work of the spirit.

“Of what does the great wisdom of all ages and nations speak? It speaks of the human spirit. You know
not the limits to the power of the spirit. You do not know over what impassable obstacles your spirit
bears you, but some day you shall awake, unharmed and everlastingly regenerated. And when life is
hard and weary, there seems to be no way out, do you not feel that some helper, your own divine spirit
is speeding to your aid? In the beauty of art and the depth of knowledge are contained the victorious
enchantment of the spirit.

“More knowledge! More art! There are not enough of these basics in life which can lead us to the
golden age of Unity. Only on the foundation of true beauty and true knowledge can a sincere
understanding between nations be achieved. And the real guide will be the universal language of
knowledge and the beauty of art.

“Contemporary life is rapidly changing, the signs of the new evolution are knocking all doors. In real
unconventional science we feel the splendid responsibility for the coming generations. Gradually, we
understand the harm of everything negative. We prepare for the next generations by valuing
enlightened positiveness and constructiveness.”

Rather than sounding old-fashioned and out of date, much of what Roerich wrote years ago sounds as if
he were writing it today. He remains the visionary, pointing our way towards a possible future.
Roerich's message of unity: the Great Synthesis, is more relevant in our times than in any previously.
Through the open doors and windows of the virtual world our opportunities for connection are
unlimited. We are all part of the Great Synthesis.

Nicholas Roerich would have been gratified and deeply moved to know that the Hague Convention of
1954 had adopted the Roerich Pact. The Banner was flown on the top peaks of the planet, the North
and South poles. In 1990 it was raised in cosmic space above the Earth at the orbital station “Mir”,
where it stayed for 10 days, and then raised a second time while many international crews were
working there in 1997. Then raised once more when the USA Space Shuttle joined “Mir”. The USA
astronaut Michael Foel said: “We hoisted this Banner of Peace into cosmic space in order to remind all
people about our universal responsibility for the fate of mankind and the planet... Flights of man into
cosmic space are the first steps towards universal culture, the symbol of which is the Banner of Peace”.

In 1999 the Banner of Peace was presented to the Secretary General of the UN Kofi Annan and in 2004
to the representative of Indian Parliament S. Chatterji, who said that it would be kept as the most
precious treasure in the Parliament of India. In 2007 the Baltic Assembly adopted the Pact and declared
April 15th as the Day of Culture in the three Baltic states – Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

Around the world, artists of all forms are working together everyday in film, music, dance, sculpture,
painting, on stage and off, bringing their uniqueness and contributing it to the whole. Through ease of
communication, world wide communities are being formed in all walks of life. With so much good
happening, its simple to recognize “the harm of everything negative.” Roerich's words are truer now
than ever before and he speaks across the years to us when he says “We prepare for the next
generations by valuing enlightened positiveness and constructiveness.”

What an epoch-making day might be before us when the Banner of Peace will be unfurled over all
countries, all centers of spirit, beauty and knowledge. This sign will call everyone to revere and value
the treasures of human greatness. However, what an epoch-making day might be before us when the
Banner of Peace and Culture will also be unfurled in our hearts, calling us to revere and value the
treasures of human greatness and the humans who produced them as well.

Ruth Abrams Drayer is a world traveler and numerologist. She moved to Bangalore, India in 1986 in
order to be closer to Svetoslav and Devika Rani Roerich and be able to participate in the rebuilding of
the Urusvati Research Center in Kulu Valley, India. (which never happened.) Upon her return to
America, she began the fifteen years of researching and writing Nicholas & Helena Roerich, The
Spiritual Journey of Two Great Artists & Peacemakers. As the book progressed, she felt called to begin
working with color – which had long been one of her loves – and so began painting. She believes her
paintings are intended to help balance and heal the planet. She has four grown children, six grandkids,
one cat and lives in Tyler, Texas. To see more of her work, www.ruthdrayer.com.