III. Impulses of Transformation for Man's Artistic Evolution II

Now let us pass on to painting. We know that painting comes about when the inner impulses of the astral body are pressed down into the etheric body; in painting we abandon the ego and live as though we were only in the astral, but were pressing it down into the etheric body. We experience ourselves in all that the ancient Moon evolution has implanted in us, this being our inner astral nature as human being. Painting is, as it were, the outward projection of this inner astral nature of ours. Just as we experience in our astral nature sorrow or joy, things that affect or impress us, whatever fate brings us, so do we experience what the painter conjures upon the canvas for us, which is a reflection of our own inner astral being.