Page 12 - An Awakening Journey Sampler

manipulating and massaging his left leg and foot which had lost feeling

from the surgery to accelerate the healing process. This was followed by a
vision in which the wall suddenly opened, allowing the hospital ward to

be filled with radiant light, smoke, and Otherworld beings. They were

monks, who surrounded him and began a three-hour operation

manipulating and cutting out sections of his back, and in a few minutes

later replacing them. Lifting him above his own body, whenever they

were working on any of its inner parts. This extraordinary experience had

a threefold result. Even though he eventually had to have more back sur-
gery in the future, he has been basically well enough to have maintained

a continuous creative outpouring for the last forty years. In 1987 after

creating black and white images for the previous ten years, he began to

paint wonderful things with aid of spirit lights which guided his hand.

Entirely self-taught, using gouache and ink, he has turned out more and

more remarkable Celtic art, in a flow that has been ever-gushing and ever

-fresh in imagination and design. Over fifty books have resulted thus far.

Just as the ancient Druids and Bards went through twenty years of

rigorous training before they were considered fully qualified to practice

their skills, so Courtney feels that, with producing each book, his art is

now being elevated to a new level of maturity. He also found that he
had the ability to be used for healing and successfully worked in various

churches and hospitals until the art took more and more of his time.

Courtney's life's work is likely being launched into a new future, whose

artistic outpouring will even more manifestly be guided by and more

easily give access to the Celtic Otherworld, from which it emerges. His

work has been exhibited widely in Western Europe and was introduced

to Chicago in 1995 at his first American exhibition. By now, many of
Courtney's original pieces can be located in private and institutional

collections.

Father Dennis O'Neill 1998 Chicago

Original foreword to St. Patrick, A Visual Celebration

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