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Gallery puja 5 Dec 2004
Described as a magical cosmopolitan event by National Gallery Senior Curator of Photography, Isobel Crombie, the recent puja (ritual worship) held on Sunday December 5 was the first of its kind at the gallery.
The event consisted of an enlivening of a shivalingam (representation of a phallus symbolising a cosmic marriage of opposites). ‘Not every workplace has one of those’, Isobel quipped.
Two Brahmin priests from the Shiva Vishnu Temple in Dandenong conducted the ceremony which included a Vedic chant. Special guest, Swami Shankarananda, director of the Shiva Meditation Centre in Mt Eliza, commented during his talk that a gallery is itself a place of worship for art.
The gallery staff will continue to honour the enlivened shivalingam by a daily offering of fruit and tumeric.
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