Helen Dahm

HELEN DAHM

Helen Dahm was a Swiss artist from Zurich (Switzerland)

(Swish Artist)

Helen Dahm was a Swiss artist from Zurich (Switzerland)

Her life time account with Meher Baba is briefed as under:

On 15th December 1933, Baba and His group arrived Zurich. At the reception, a woman who later became one of the foremost artists in Switzerland met Baba for the first time; her name was Helen Dahm and years later she stayed in India with other Westerners and did significant painting for Baba.

In Zurich on 13th July 1934, Baba gave private interviews from nine in the morning until six that evening and met with more than 50 Swiss and Europeans. Norina interpreted for those who did not speak English.

Norina introduced a painter named Helen Dahm. Baba remarked to her, “I am also a painter. I paint the hearts of people with the colors of spirituality.”

On 27th August 1937, Helen Dahm arrived from Switzerland with the Swiss sculptress and Indian art scholar, Alice Boner, 48. Boner had come in contact with the dancer Uday Shankar in 1927 and three years later traveled with him to India for the first time to organize his dance troupe. She had been instrumental in having Uday Shankar contact Baba in 1933.

On 28th June 1938, Helen Dahm with three other Westerners arrived in Bombay from Switzerland on the Conte Verde and was driven to Ahmednagar to join Baba’s burgeoning ashram.

From August 1938, the Swiss artist Helen Dahm started painting colorful murals on the inside walls of Meher Baba’s crypt. She was absorbed in her work from morning to evening. Although Helen was not a young woman, (she was 60 at the time) out of love, she worked on her back on top of scaffolding to paint the dome’s ceiling. Hedi Mertens, also a painter, assisted Helen by mixing her paints; but Helen did the actual painting of the figures.

In March 1939, Helen Dahm fell ill with colitis in Bhopal and was taken to a hospital on 8th March. Irene was instructed to stay with her. Baba would visit them, yet his health, too, was breaking down. He was suffering diarrhea. He passed more than a dozen stools one day and had a fever.

Helen Dahm had recovered from her abdominal illness and come to Jabalpur from Bhopal with Irene on 23rd March 1939. After three more weeks in India, on 17th April 1939, Baba sent her back home to Switzerland. “Separation from the Beloved is real suffering, and the pain of such spiritual agony only a heart torn away from him knows. Tears are powerless to express the depth of such suffering. But the fire ignited by tears has power, and the Beloved is touched by it. Once the fire of his remembrance is lit, it never stops burning, and is extinguished only when the lover is burnt to ashes.

On 16th July 1956, Baba left Satara for Bombay, where He stayed for the day at Ashiana. Same night Baba, with few mandali men flew from Santa Cruz airport on Air India Flight 103 (economy class). On the way to London, the plane stopped for about an hour each at Damascus and Beirut. By the afternoon they arrived at Kloten Airport in Zurich, where Baba met about 35 Europeans close lovers including Helen Dahm.


Resources

References/Images from: Various Lord Meher volumes, discontinued website's ambprasarkendra & love-remembrances, images and dates, stories etc from respective copyright owners websites or publications used with permission - i.e. In His Service, Glow International, MeherBabaTravels, MSI and MNP Collections, from AvatarMeherBabaTrust, BelovedArchives websites and from various other website sources, Books, journal etc. More information where ever available with us like letter scans, stories etc are added. Kindly feel free to Contact us with any updates, photos or corrections etc.
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