Over the past three years, ARAS has been forming a vision for our future. After the successful launching of ARAS Online and the publication of the world-wide bestselling The Book of Symbols, we began asking ourselves “What next?” How will we grow ARAS in the future and present it to a world wide audience while maintaining our core commitment to the development of an archive and institution that explores symbolic imagery from all cultures and all eras? Cultural and archetypal commentary distinguishes ARAS from other online sources of images that flood the internet without any context for understanding and perspective. In depth context of symbolic imagery with cross-cultural connections is at the heart of our mission. Some years ago, I heard that the future of internet content would be “curated content”—content that has been carefully edited, selected, and vetted. ARAS has been in the forefront of “curated content” and will remain one of the few sites that actually lives up to that standard.

We came up with two primary areas for the focus of our vision for the future:  “Growing the Archive Itself” and “Growing ARAS in the World”. In this Welcome I want to report on the creation of the ARAS International Advisory Board which represents a significant step in our effort to fulfill that part of our vision focused on “Growing ARAS in the World”. After the core of ARAS came to the United States from original presentations of art exhibits created to illustrate analytical psychology and its relation to other disciplines at the Eranos Lectures in Ascona Switzerland in the 1930’s, most of its research and development was centered in the United States. ARAS continued to explore symbolic imagery from mythology, religion, art history, archaeology and other sources from around the world, but was now fundamentally a US enterprise. The creation of the world wide Internet changed our reach and potential enormously. We were relatively early in the creation of ARAS Online at the turn of this century and we are now in a position to further develop our reach by engaging world wide scholars in our effort. With that in mind, we have created an International Advisory Board with the purpose of bringing new material to us from around the world and in helping us better relate to and reach out to a world made both smaller and larger by the reach of the Internet. Here are the first members of our newly created International Advisory Board whom we welcome and thank for joining with us in “Growing ARAS in the World.”

Australia:  Craig San Roque 

Brazil:  Andrea Fiuza Hunt

China:  Heyong Shen

Denmark:  Aksel Haaning

France:  Christian Gaillard

Great Britian:  Jules Cashford

India:  Kusum Dhar Prabhu 

Israel:  Janice Shapiro

Peru:  Patricia Llosa 

United States:  John Beebe

Taiwan:  Shiuya Sara Liuh

Venezuela:  Axel Capriles