Grunow’s long-time assistant Hildegard Heitmeyer observed Schunke’s machinations helplessly, writing an angry report in 1956 where she accused him of being a charlatan:
“His (Schunke’s) essays as well as his healing method are based on the research of G.G. and are mixed with all kinds of different schools of thought—astrology, yoga etc.! The ingenious research on sound and color, Gertrud Grunow’s life-work, for which she fought and suffered, is in the hands of a charlatan and an honor-seeker!”31
Heitmeyer regarded the injection of astrological and yogic ideas as a falsification of Grunow’s ideas. The fact that she wasn’t quite right, however, is proven by a previously unpublished Grunow quote from her later years. In the estate of the former Grunow student and art teacher Erich Parnitzke there is a letter from Grunow to Itten in which she refers to yoga practices:
“What you report about the ultimate union of all the senses in one as the highest level, I spoke about in London with one of the first (naturopathic) doctors there, Dr. de Right, who was born in London, lived there until his fourteenth year and then again 10 and 12 years later, who has a deep love and knowledge of yoga teachings, also practically. He worked with me and claimed that of all the European practices, my method of working was the only one that corresponded to the right kind of yoga. …”32
In fact, the unity of the senses was central to Grunow’s ideas. She found this unity realized in the preconscious and the unconscious—in the world of sensation. She and Dr. Werner investigated such “primal synaesthesias” practically and experimentally, as original modes of perception. The developmental psychology of the time assumed that these “primitive” sensations, in which the senses do not appear differentiated, were still active in so-called “primitive peoples”—in Egypt, Babylonia, China and Mexico—as well as in children, artists and “mentally ill” people.33
Although Grunow closely associated her ideas with the problematic psychological research of the time, her recounting of this London anecdote makes it clear that she by no means rejected the comparison to yoga or considered it abstruse. A non-intellectual, meditative concentration on something imagined or something outside the world—a candle or a color—is something Grunow’s practice shared with other meditative practices then current. The use of sound—a piano or a singing bowl—can be found in such practices. The flow of prana as a respiratory flow and life energy does not seem far away from her teaching. These are commonalities on a very general level and it is not at all surprising they found their ways in Grunow’s pedagogy. And in many respects Grunow’s work departed from yoga and meditative techniques: for example, her forms of movement differ greatly from yoga. Grunow’s students did not have to twist or strain themselves greatly, nor did they sit or lie on the floor in her exercises as far as is known. In addition, and this also distinguishes her pedagogy from yoga and meditation, Grunow practice was aimed at supporting artistic-creative work, and thus pursued a practical purpose determined individually for each student.
Current discussions regarding the growing significance, even instrumentalization, of yoga and meditation in Western societies nevertheless opens up one of the central beliefs informing Grunow’s teachings. She believed modern man’s nervousness stemmed from the urban environment, which had consequently led to a loss of inner balance. Nevertheless, Grunow did not proselytize or advocate exiting society or a radical return to nature. After her time at the Bauhaus Weimar, she commuted between Berlin, Hamburg and London, consciously leading an urban life. Grunow created exercises that helped individuals to “come to oneself” within an environment characterized by speed and time pressure—to gird oneself to face the hectic life-world instead of changing life from the ground up. This approach appears more relevant than ever considering the flood of techniques for harmonizing body and mind offered today—from purification treatments to yoga and mindfulness classes to various forms of “retreats.”