Alejandro Jodorowsky embodies the crazy, creative wisdom of the spiritual warrior. Whether he's making movies, writing books, practicing Zen under a master, learning sexual tantra from Gurdjieff's daughter, giving free tarot readings to all comers, he is the artist, as Dylan says, who doesn't look back.
Jodorowsky's best known works are films he made in the late `60s and early `70s—El Topo and The Holy Mountain. These films are as grotesque as they are beautiful, laden with archetypal imagery as though lifted from the tarot deck, rendering blatantly inner elements and story lines. His films quickly became cult classics, particularly after John Lennon championed and funded his work.
His most recent film, made after a 20-year hiatus from filmmaking, is Dance of Reality (2014). The story is a phantasmagorical weaving of autobiographical narrative into a symbolist tapestry in which his mother, played by diva Pamela Flores, operatically singing her lines, is an ultrafeminine archetype—passionate, grounded, and loyal. And his father, played by Jodorowsky's son Brontis, is a cruel and idealistic man on a mission to assassinate the Chilean dictator but instead becomes his horse trainer. So surreal, the film feels more real than life. The film failed to snag a distribution deal and effectively no one has seen it.
Born in Chile to a Jewish immigrant family fleeing the pogroms in Russia, Jodorowsky emigrated to France in his 20s and founded The Panic Movement (in reference to the wild, uninhibited god Pan), a school of no-holds-barred, psychotransformist performance art. "The panic man is not, he is ever becoming," says Jodorowsky.
In addition to his films, Jodorowsky has written more than 20 books, including novels, an autobiography, works on psychology (or psychomagic, as he calls it), Tarot, and graphic novels. His most recent work, discussed in this interview, is Where the Bird Sings Best (Restless Books, 2015), a novel about his ancestral lineage, which itself is an example of the psychological teachings described in his book Metagenealogy: Self-Discovery Through Psychomagic and the Family Tree, "a practical guide to recognizing and overcoming the patterns and influences of the four generations before you."
Performance luminary Marina Abramovic said of Jodorowsky, "I divide the world into two categories: the originals, and the ones who follow. The originals are the people looking differently, who take the simple elements of everyday life and make miracles. And for me, Alejandro, you are the one original."
I was honored to have the opportunity to interview Mr. Jodorowsky in March.
—Jason Stern
What is the purpose of this new book, Where the Bird Sings Best?
What is the purpose of an apple tree to make an apple? I make a book because I am an artist. So why does an artist make a book? For the same reason that an apple tree makes an apple.
I understand from reading Metagenealogy that it's a kind of an exercise for you.
I am very aware that I am mortal. The older I get, the more clear it is. So then, I want to know who I am. That is the first question: Who am I, what am I, in this body? Why am I in this world, why am I in this century? And then I search myself. In order to know who I am, I need to know from where I came. Maybe I don't know who I am, but I do know I come from my mother and my father. I come from a long line of ancestors, as you do—a lot of couples, men and women, who wanted to find something together, life, maybe love. Your father and mother, they are two; then your grandparents, there are four persons, eight persons, and then 16 persons, 32 persons, and then thousands of persons, searching for love and making children.
I went very far back into my family history. I came to the moment when the Jewish people were expelled from Spain. That was important for me. I am a product of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. I am also the product of when Czar Alexander started to kill the Jews in Russia. Then my grandparents escaped to Chile. I was born in Chile. Why? That is why I wrote this book, and then searching my genealogical tree, I discovered a lot of things. I discovered that these people didn't live their lives fully because they suffered, and I needed to heal my genealogical tree and give to every person who made me, a realization. I realized all my ancestors, in a good way. For example, the sister of my father was a prostitute. So I gave to her the possibility to be married with the president of the republic. I realized her. That is why I wrote this book.
So how much of the book is factual, and how much is creating new possibilities?
Everything comes from real things, everything. For example, a Velàzquez painting, a Picasso painting—they are real, but they are not real, because they are artistic work. So it's a mixing: Is reality what reality is, or is it all how you see reality? In reality, no one can speak about the real reality. No one knows that. We are a planet covered by millions of crazy persons.
I heard a teacher say that our task in life is to repair the past and prepare the future.
I would say, forgive the past. Forgive: understand what happened, understand why, and then you can forgive. Myself, I needed to forgive my father, my mother, my grandparents, the hatred in the families. A lot of things. So I did that. But also I want to show other people how to do that.
So that's an aspect of repairing, to forgive your ancestors, your parents?
There are two ways. Yes, I forgive my parents. But in another way, I need to be forgiven by my parents, because I disappointed them. My father wanted me to be a businessman, working for money; maybe to be a doctor or a lawyer. I wanted to make puppets, to be a dancer, a mime, a poet. So he was very sad because of that. I failed for him. So then, he needs to forgive me. I am very happy with what I did in my life, but it was a catastrophe for him.
So is there a simultaneous quality that the past and future and present are of a single fabric, and what takes place in the present is impacting the future and the past?
There you are speaking of the problem of time, of past, present, future. It's a very complex thing, because there is no time. It's a human invention. There are changes; the universe is changing. I don't know my age; I know my changes. If the world is not changing, there's no time. Also, reality doesn't start and doesn't finish. It's a continuity. So then, how do we think about present, past, future? The future is not there. There is only the present. The future will be. You and I are making a future, in this moment. If we didn't speak today, we would be making another pattern, making another future. Who knows what will happen as a result of this conversation?
Your books and films contain rich and beautiful language and images, and there is also ugliness and violence—similar to mythology or fairy tales, more figurative than literal. Can you say something about ugliness and beauty, and their purpose?
Beautiful is everything that gives to you the possibility to have a happy life. Ugly is everything that impedes you in having a happy life. But also, suffering is a sacred thing, because it's an obstacle to your growth. If a plant doesn't fight, it doesn't grow. From a seed in the earth, if it can overcome the cold, the dry, the insects, then it's strong, it's a good plant. So we need to voluntarily submit to some kinds of problems of living, in order to vanquish them, and to bring out what we really are, what we want. You need to fight against the world in order to live well. You need to live your own reality. It's not a thing they give to you. They give to you a nonreality.
I knew a Zen master who needed to speak with a group about Zen, and when he came to the place where he was to speak, a bird started to sing. The master just said, "That is my message. Good-bye." The bird sings because he's happy. Naturally. He has no motive for singing. He doesn't say to himself, "Why am I singing?" No, he sings because it's natural, it's authentic. And inside our intellect, when we make silent emptiness, the birds sing—in the heart, when full of love.
The epigraph for Where the Bird Sings Best is from Jean Cocteau: "Where the bird sings best is in the genealogical tree."
Yes, that is the meaning of the title.
Creative energy, and experiencing the flow of being and doing and creating, is something that people seek through spiritual work. They meditate, they chant, they do practices to come into a kind of fullness of life.
These days there are a lot of people searching, as if for an object. Searching for illumination, satori, baraka. Searching for this, for that. Searching to construct myself a soul, trying to do something. But we have nothing to construct. We have everything. We were born perfect, and we are perfect; but we don't know. And then the only thing we need to do is to take out prejudice. That is the work; not to "do something." Just to take out prejudice, to be free. No definition in the mind, no definition in the heart, no definition in the sex, no definition in the body. I can be free to do every movement I want. I can think whatever I want. I have no age. I have no nationality. I am not this or that. I am free. I am a body, that is all. That is to be free, and if you are free, you are yourself. And if you are yourself, well, what more do you want? You cannot have more than what you are. I am what I am. And I feel very good, you know?
Let's talk again about your book.
When I wrote this book, I knew that I was in the Latin American literature. I am not Garcia Márquez or Neruda, and I knew that if I started to speak about my genealogical tree, as a Jew, I would no longer be included in the literature of Latin America. They cannot accept that. But now I am happy, because with the Jewish immigration so big in America, I believe I can find, at last, a public for my book, because I believe in my book. I took a lot of time to construct it, to go through history, to search my family, because the family stories are a secret. They don't want to speak about painful things. You need to work to find that information. I did it, and now I hope I will communicate that to people.
How did you do the research? Where did you find the information about your family?
From the family who was alive at the time. You know, when I was 23 years old, I cut my tree. I stopped seeing my family, forever. It was very difficult, but I did it. You need to be a real hero or a bad criminal to never see your mother, your father, your sister, your grandparents. I stopped. Twenty-three years old, I came to Paris alone. I was finished with my family. And then I started to suffer, because it was a big anguish to quit with this family. I said, I am not a Christian, why do I need to forgive a person who was like a monster? Why do I need to try to love people who never loved me, who were always fighting, who never gave me any nurturing? I quit with them, and it was forever. My sister, my mother, my father—all of them died.
So the last time you saw any of them was when you were 23?
Yes. And then later, I searched for friends of them, doing research, like an ethnologue, scientific. I was searching. In Metagenealogy I explain the importance of the genealogical tree. But in order to discover how important was this tree, I needed to cut it. All people have a family, but I needed to not have a family. I had to sacrifice that to realize the importance of a good family.
So, what was the effect of that sacrifice?
It made me really strong. I have been fighting all my life. This is why I make pictures without fear. I do what I want. It made me very strong, very strong.
Sometimes when people become very strong, they become dangerous—overblown ego.
We need to speak about the ego, also, because as you know, the gurus say, "Kill your ego," and they have an enormous ego, right? They say to kill your ego, but the ego is necessary. Every one of us has it. The ego is individuality, because every one of us is different from the others. Every person has a unique point of view with a gift for the universe, for us. So the ego needs to be dominated. If the ego controls you, your essential being, that is terrible. But if you control your ego, it is really useful, and beautiful. I respect the ego very much, but not in an egoist way. When you dominate your ego, you learn things through your ego; you learn to give things, to be generous, but in secret. It's fantastic to give to people, to give in secret, without the thank-you of the others. And that makes you very strong.
There is the dance made by Gurdjieff, with all the people making the same movements, with no individuality. But Gurdjieff himself is not dancing. Gurdjieff never danced with the others. He had an enormous personality, a huge ego. We all have an ego, but we shouldn't kill it. And don't dance with a group. Or, dance with the group, and then dance alone also. Make your own group, and be the choreographer. Do you understand that?
I understand it, yes. And I also teach the Gurdjieff movements.
Ah, that's why I thought of that. That is synchronicity. I thought about something you are doing. Maybe I am trying to help you.
I notice that in many spiritual traditions, it becomes very controlled, everybody doing their practice, but individuality isn't allowed, and the creativity doesn't come in. It seems like creative energy is the most powerful energy that we have if it can become connected to spiritual work and inner work.
Yes. When you make a movement, a mechanical movement that is about perfection, it's not useful unless it's brought into life. You practice, and you learn discipline. But discipline is not the goal. As you go in your boat, you need to traverse the river; but the goal is not the boat. The goal is to go out, traveling, to traverse the river. Discipline is necessary, but it's not the goal.
Can art be a kind of medicine to heal society?
Art is not medicine, no. The illness is an invention. Illness is not your nature. Art shows you that you are not ill. It shows you how you really are. You are not an ill person; you have parasites. We are full of parasites. I call it prejudice. We are full of mental prejudice. We need to take that out, and that is the role of art, to show dignity to you, your human dignity.
Art is not a business. We need to search: What is a human soul? What is art? Art is: I need to find in myself what is beautiful in my human being in order to give to others and show to others that they are beautiful. I must not make art to be admired myself. I need to admire humanity. I need to teach humanity to admire itself.
If art is not a business, then is making money a curse for an artist?
No, no. If you want money because you're a good doctor, that's good. But if you are a doctor because you want money, that will kill a lot of persons. If you make art for money, you will destroy a lot of persons. But if you make real art, and you also want money, that is good, because that permits you to continue it, to promote a new life. It's different. Money is not poison. The way you use the money, that's the problem. The industries now destroying the Earth—that is the bad employ of money. Also, money is bad if only a few have a lot and the many have only a little. We should not be a society of slaves. We need the art to show that.
To show it's possible?
Yes. That's what I'm doing. It's not to change the world—that's not possible. But in any moment, you can start to change the world. It's very difficult to change yourself, but in any moment, you can start to change yourself. We can start, and that is important, to start. The intention is important, and step by step, that will lead to it. Not immediately. Step by step.