Taken Under Operations

The shakers, the source of many predominant themes american folk art, believed that every action, effort and creation was a form of prayer and worship to be completed with the utmost honesty, simplicity. They believed in temperance in every aspect of life. This even included life long vows of celibacy, which has inevitably lead to a dwindling of the Shaker faith, there are only about four left.

This emphasis on the pared down lead to a preoccupation by the shakers with the idea of the individual becoming a primal vessel through which deceased sprits could communicate messages to living. During communal services members of the congregation, would reportedly "take in" the spirits and begin to erratically gesture, and move, while calling out in incoherent words and phrases.

This phenomena reached a climax during a period from 1837-1847 entitled by the shakers the era of manifestations. In this period members of the faith were regularly "taken under operations" by various deceased figures such as the first founders of the shaker faith, ancient Native American tribes, even prominent historical figures such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Those in which the spirits "manifested" appeared dazed, sometimes whirling about or enacting the spirits behavior, or what was believed to be their behavior, even speaking in tongues (which was often interpreted as dialects of native american languages.) They were described in certain accounts as "withdrawn from the scene of time."

To record these sacred transmissions a "recipient", another Shaker, would be present to transcribe the movements and sounds being made. The final "transcriptions" of these events ranged from drawings, to hymns, to dances, to letters and poems addressed to certain specific shaker individuals or in some cases the entire shaker community. these documents, being sacred and precious, were referred to as gems, tokens, chains, fire, crowns, shields, cravats, boxes, sweet cakes, milk, honey, hearts and gifts. The recipients transcriptions of the manifesteds' incoherent behavior produced surprisingly detailed and crafted drawings, dances and songs. Many of the drawings formal compositions, the choreography of dances are symmetrical or circular. The songs, or as they are commonly referred to "spirituals" also have a circular quality in that they are often extremely short compositions are sung in repetition. Many of these "spirituals" are transcribed in the original unknown tongue, many were later fitted with english language lyrics.