2.3: Inside the Fellowship: Impressions of Renaissance

I first travelled to Apollo, then called Renaissance, within a year of joining the Fellowship. The property is a large area of hills and a few small lakes in a remote part of northern California. To get there the only way is by car, and it takes about six hours. I hired a car from San Francisco airport and used a map supplied by the car rental company combined with sketched instructions from one of the London Centre Directors. In those days there was no sat-nav. I passed over the Oakland bridge, on through low hills and then a long journey in the flat rather drab landscape which is mostly farming and vineyards. Then the landscape changed to the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, climbing up through hills laced with conifers and scrub, eventually passing Collins Lake shortly to reach the small town of Oregon House, then off the main highway towards the property.

In those days it was traditional that Fellowship students from around the world would travel to Renaissance in September for the grape harvest. The hills on the property had almost all been terraced to grow grape vines and the Renaissance winery had become known for producing some very high quality wines in small volumes. 

Nothing was compulsory, but there was little point in being there unless you joined in. We were given rubber gloves and secateurs and shown how to gather the bunches of grapes. A small tractor with a trailer ran between the rows for us to empty the grapes into.

Simple but delicious food was provided for lunch. One had to book for the evening meal. Both meals were provided in a building on top of a hill with beautiful views over the property, including a terrace when the weather was fine, which it usually was. This was originally called ‘The Lodge’ but was renamed ‘Apollo d’Oro’ (‘Golden Apollo’) later on, when the property began to be decorated with large baroque statues which Robert Burton had had gilded.

In spite of my natural shyness I found it easy to introduce myself and join conversations. The other students were gentle and none were loud or overbearing—I attribute this to the exercises of not expressing negative emotions and of putting false personality in abeyance. Whether in any individual the gentleness was yet another act of personality or was genuine I could not tell—I felt it was genuine. In any case there is a saying in ordinary life, ‘fake it till you make it.’ Either way it was safe to be in essence, unguarded. If by chance anyone did express negativity towards me, that was their problem not mine. 

The topic of conversation was almost always ‘the Work.’ This was hardly surprising given that students were from many different backgrounds and from many parts of the world. ‘The Work’ was the school equivalent of talking about the weather.

Most days during harvest there were meetings led by the teacher, Robert Burton. Originally students would give angles related to the topic. In subsequent years the meetings would become more and more controlled, with angles being pre-printed on cards—some of the angles would be from students, submitted in advance, but mostly they were one-liners from ‘conscious beings’—Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu, or others of the forty-four designated by Robert. If a student thought the angle they had been given was relevant they would raise their hand and stand to read the angle if called upon. In later years this became even more controlled, and Robert’s helpers would read angles which would be projected onto large television screens together with related images.

Over the years I made several trips to Apollo, and at each visit the beautiful impressions increased: a fountain featuring a large statue of Poseidon surrounded by ornamental fishes that spouted water in a circle, tall pencil-thin cypresses near the border of the property and leading up to the winery, rows of cycads along the road leading up to Apollo d’Oro, roundabouts at the road intersections later adorned with flags and gilded statues on pedestals, and a rose garden with pergolas. 

The most impressive building was, on my first visit, the Ming Museum, which at that time housed probably the finest collection of Ming dynasty furniture in the world. The museum from the outside was quite a good pastiche of a single-storey French chateau, and inside it was austere and minimalist, with polished wood floors. In the early days Robert encouraged this minimalist style, and there was a joke that on a night out students would paint the town beige.

On later trips the Ming furniture was gone, sold, and Robert had moved back into what had been the museum, which now became his personal dwelling, apart from the main hall in the centre which was used for meetings. The museum, later re-named the Academy, gradually became filled with antiques inspired by Robert Burton’s visits to the Musée Jaquemart-André in Paris and the Wallace Collection in London. The central hall had Louis XIV-style furniture upholstered in pink moire fabric, with similar fabric in panels on the walls which were also adorned with paintings by a Fellowship student G., of Egyptian gods and floral decorations. In front of a huge mirror were candle-holders and clocks supported by gilded nude figures. There was a large golden angel flying above an antique French tapestry. This hung behind the area where Robert Burton would sit for meetings, raised on a dais and flanked with whichever students were chosen for this honour. On another wall was the painting The Toilet of Venus by Guercino (the painting was the subject of a dispute with the Italian government, I understand).

The entrance lobby after the double front doors and before the meeting hall later had a ceiling painting, also by G., which included a naked Venus in a double scallop shell and a naked flying man with a full-on erection. The quality of the work was of a very high order and so somehow did not seem obscene, although I’m not sure I’d want it in a public space.

To the front and the back of the Academy was a rose garden, and to one side a potager, a vegetable garden arranged in a semi-circle and decorated with occasional French statues in the classical manner, of goddesses and cherubs. It was unquestionably a beautiful place to be in. On the other side another garden in a more intimate style was made, including a small covered area devoted to bonsai trees.

As Apollo developed, other features were added: large marquees in an Indian style for outdoor meetings, an Indian wooden screen and a large dancing Shiva. 

The winery did not flourish financially, despite the quality of its wines. One of the winemakers left the school and continues to produce small batches of wine nearby. Most of the vine terraces are now neglected. The school is supported largely or solely from the contributions of students (I assume: no-one outside the central elite ever sees the account books).

One major source of income was clearly the events for which students from around the world would visit. One gave one’s time for free, and volunteering was genuinely voluntary. But the events themselves were expensive. That one had paid one’s dues did not entitle one to attend even a meeting with the Teacher without additional payment. Teaching dinners were expensive. One could (entirely voluntarily) have one’s picture taken with Robert, or split the cost between several students. I used to have many of these photographs. Distaste for what I have come to understand about Robert has led to my destroying them.