On January 13, 1923, George Ivanovic Gurdjieff, the much-discussed spiritual leader of the last century, publicly inaugurated his Study House, a refurbished airplane hangar erected on the grounds of the Prieure des Basse Loges, a former Carmelite monastery in Fontainebleau outside Paris which housed Gurdjieff’s Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man. Gaily decorated with arabesques, spread with rich, oriental carpets, furnished with a small fountain illuminated by multicolored lights, this exotic corner of the East transported to the environs of Paris exerted a magnetic attraction over a great number of intellectuals, writers, artists, dancers, musicians who flocked there to witness the extraordinary performances of Gurdjieff’s Sacred Dances and Movements, accompanied by stirring, melancholy piano music composed by Thomas deHartmann with the master Gurdjieff. Read More
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