Why recreate the Woodstock LIGHT VW Bus Today?
Mission Statement from Artist Bob Hieronimus
on His Motivation to Resurrect this Talisman
Musician Bob Grimm on top of LIGHT at Woodstock
In 1968 when I first designed the Woodstock LIGHT VW Bus, it was a painful year for America. The year before had celebrated the Summer of Love, and Sgt. Pepper had turned many of us on to expanding our consciousness to a higher and more meaningful state of existence. I was among many who began regular meditations and communal living and eating vegetarian. The world was changing for the better. Then came the My Lai massacre and other horrific turns in Vietnam in early 1968, followed by the shocking assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in April of that year. Student-led occupations and strikes, and draft card burnings began amping up the anger in the Spring. Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination in June was like the nail in the coffin. The bad guys had completely reversed our course.
This was the state of consciousness during the months of 1968 when I was commissioned by my friend Bob Grimm to cover his VW van in symbols and turn it into a “magic bus.” My friend Bob Grimm and I were sharing the new understanding and shifts in consciousness brought on by a daily meditation habit, and we both knew that a rolling billboard of symbols would reach people with their messages without ever needing words. I decided to pour all my intention into the magical purpose of redirecting the consciousness of viewers away from the current administration’s constant drumbeat of war and suppression.
Dr. Bob Hieronimus, Ph.D. on top of the VW Beetle “Old Smoke”, his first artcar.
I chose symbols from the ancient mystery traditions, including the ouroboros or snake biting its tail, astrological symbols, Rosicrucian crosses and alphabets from Atlantis. Everything from the Egyptian Sphinx to the Lotus Flowers suggesting the expansion of the soul is interlocked in intricate waves of vibrating energy to show we are all one and connected with the cosmic creator on a vibrational level.
Dee Dimitri, model, standing next to an early iteration of the LIGHT bus—both painted by Dr. Bob.
In 2018, after several years of hope and change inspiring optimism for compassionate creatives like me, we are once again being shocked daily by new manifestations of the bad guys reasserting their domination and control paradigm, trying to convince America to look out for selfish motivations first and be impressed by material glamour only. A corporate oligarchy has assumed near-complete control of the enlightened representative democracy designed by our ancestors. While there are many factors to explain on a material level how we got here, from an occultist’s perspective, we can focus on the power of symbols to create change on a subconscious level.
We see the 50th anniversary of Woodstock, that peaceful gathering of thousands all intent on ending war and living in peace, as a sufficient motivation to recreate the Woodstock LIGHT VW Bus. A lot of hard work and great expense is going to be poured into this effort, but the most important part will be the intentional will of the artist team assembled to help me recreate an exact duplicate of the LIGHT. Our hope is that resurrecting this bus will contribute to a redirecting of consciousness and a revival of optimism for a humanity that understands itself as All One People On One Planet working together for the benefit of everyone. When the Hippies morphed into Yuppies and greed defined the following generations, the LIGHT was dimmed, but did not die. When the corporation was granted human rights the military-industrial complex appeared to have won, but they did not anticipate the power of the Inner Light when multiplied exponentially by the masters and the multitudes.
Those who have practiced meditation and developed spiritually can use their intuition to enter the fourth dimension where spiritual vision is open. In the future — if humankind does not destroy itself first — we will evolve to a point where the power of intuition reveals the truth at all times. The world of politics will never be the same because no one can lie in the fourth dimension. A state of transparency is created by this state of inner peace in which lies would be immediately detected. These realms can be reached even today through the study of Theosophy, Anthroposophy, Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism, meditation, and most importantly: service to others.
Symbols are a bridge between the conscious and unconscious mind. They are assimilated into our consciousness quickly, even after just a fleeting glance as they speed by on the highway. Our society’s contemporary disintegrative state is partially explained by our failure to connect to meaningful myths and symbols. Recreating this magic talisman now can and will empower our nation and perhaps our planet to elevate our consciousness and take one more step towards One People On One Planet.
Get on the bus and donate to the kickstarter campaign online!
