The Everson Museum of Art was quiet on a snowy, Saturday morning in the middle of January. Their doors opened at 10 a.m., but many local residents were staying indoors, preparing for the winter storm that was set to hit that afternoon. A series of harmonized “om” chants floated out of a gallery on the second floor. There, amid an exhibit celebrating last year’s 50th anniversary of the museum, the floor was polka-dotted with brightly colored yoga mats and 15 seated students, ready as Dara Harper’s, Yoga with HeART, class began. 

Harper has taught the class every week since the museum reached out to her six years ago. The partnership was born out of the desire to make the museum more accessible to the community — to make everyone feel like there’s something there for them, said Kimberly Griffiths, curator of education at the Everson. The class, she said, is an alignment of yoga and art. 

“(The space) is meditative and peaceful,” Griffiths said. “When you’re in a pose, it gives you the opportunity to observe and contemplate a work of art.” 

Harper, who has been teaching yoga for almost 25 years, has a steady following of about 18 students per class at the museum. To keep the art safe, students always practice at least three feet away from the walls and sculptures. 

“When we’re around visually inspiring art, it’s really useful because as people are in poses, their minds tend to wander, and if you’re going to wander anyway, they may as well look at beautiful things,” Harper said. “It gives you something to shift your mood.” 

Harper prepares a philosophical piece for class each week, she said. The “asana,” or pose practice, usually reflects pieces of the philosophical ideas. On this particular day, Harper starts out the class by offering a personal story, relating it to the proverb: If you have a pebble in your shoe, remove it rather than learning to walk with a limp. 

Those bits of inspiration are one of the many reasons Nancy Daley has been attending the class for the past six years. The museum makes an elegant invitation to attend class, Daley said, and provides a reason to visit the museum more frequently. 

“It’s a nice merging of the physical self and visual beauty,” she said. “The art invites you to be gentle.” 

Daley started attending classes as an activity to do with her teenage daughter. During her first class, she couldn’t make it through the practice without taking a break. Now, she is one of the strongest students, Harper said. 

Her class requires all muscle groups to work together, Harper said, rather than targeting certain muscles, as one might do with a gym machine. Daley said the class has made her feel stronger from within. 

“You get to know muscles or know your body in ways you didn’t know,” Daley said. 

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As she continues her practice, Daley delights in achieving poses she had previously struggled with — namely Ardha Chandrasana, or “Half Moon Pose.”  

But the class is about more than how long or far you stretch, Daley said. It’s the feeling of tension and balance. It’s a flowing exploration of each pose — and no matter what pose Harper has the students in, they can see different displays and galleries.  

The yoga practice follows ideas around form and lines found in the body, Harper said. During the practice, she can point to the artwork and the practitioners’ bodies alike, how lines and curves work together. But the art also serves as a pleasing backdrop, she added. 

While the art on the walls and within the gallery where they practice may change from week to week, every class ends the same, Daley said. Everyone smiles and bows as they say namaste — a Sanskrit word meaning “I bow to you.”

Published on January 30, 2019 at 9:47 pm

Contact Taylor: tnwatson@syr.edu