Water: Leonardo Da Vinci, Carl Jung And The Dream State

Water is our means of subsistence and makes as much part of our surroundings as ourselves. As it is said we are 70% water and our planet contains a lot more water than soil. So it is natural that water would be depicted in art.

Water of course is also cleansing and many would say it has a special force. Potent enough in nature and throughout history to be the culprit for tsunamis and floods. Leonardo saw this element's power and recorded it in his "The Deluge" (1514) sketches which remain in the Royal Library of Windsor for posterity.

Carl Jung Swiss psychiatrist once said "Water is the collective unconciousness that contains all memories from the beginning" He also was an artists as it can be perceived from "The Red Book" which is a dream diary containing enigmatic Byzantine designs, ancient characters, and mandalas shaped by fluent abstractions taking the form of water.Today there is proof that Carl Jung's philosophy is consistent with studies undertaken in Aerospace Stuggart which show water as maintaining the shape of flowers it embraces as if it had memory and contained information.

Carl Jung and Leonardo Da Vinci's art is not similar due to factors we won't be discussing. But the question remains as whether both artists not only knew of the capacities of water but if in fact they experienced water as a recurrent factor in their subconscious life. Leonardo's description of "The Deluge" is the following

`I have seen motions of air so furious that they have gathered up and mingled in their course the largest trees of the forests and whole roofs of great palaces, and this same fury made a hollow opening with its vortex motion and excavated a gravel pit and transported gravel, sand and water more than half a mile through the air' (W.12665v).

The description could potentially have been a dream as many as the ones experienced by Carl Jung despite commentators sustaining that Leonardo's inspiration was the Biblical deluge. What if the atom in Leonardo's psyche which Carl Jung holds responsible for the guiding self to manifest was the core inspiration by Leonardo's sketches. And if so what could this dream like pattern have to say about this historical character.