EFFI CASEY

Having been born into a family of artists and musicians in Germany set the direction of my life’s path from the beginning. My grandfather, Carl Bantzer, was a well known painter as was my father, Karl Francis Bantzer, whose life was abruptly ended during the last days of World War II. He left behind a wife and five children.

The hardship of post-war Germany did not prevent my family to pursue the study of music and the arts. To the contrary, music, painting, drawing and home theater performances sustained us when food was meager. From early on we were taught “to see” and be in awe of Nature. An equally nourishing environment was provided in my thirteen years of Waldorf (Rudolf Steiner) education. I started violin lessons when I was seven and painted my first (conscious!) self portrait when I was twelve.

 Music and the Fine Arts have characterized the various stages of my life. To this day they infuse all aspects of my reality, providing the fertile ground for ever new beginnings and explorations. Listening! Always listening. I am listening to colors as I paint, searching for the harmonious “sound” of one color to the other, I listen to the wind and the light as I paint a landscape, I listen to Nature as I search for the underlying “pattern” of a plant, I listen to what lies beyond the notes as I play a Mozart string quartet or as I conduct a choral piece, I listen “into” the being of another person and discover ever new realms of being. For me listening transcends what is and is the celebration of the Divine.

 My art and music are the humble exploration of the riches of Nature and Creation itself and if one or the other can provoke resonance in the soul of others, it is an unexpected, yet gratifying outcome beyond the enrichment I experience myself in the creative process of art.

Taliesin, April 2018