The Edge of Reason, catalogue (2011)
Filed under catalogue | Tags: · art, irrational, mysticism, occultism, rationalism, science
The exhibition The Edge of Reason, curated by Norwegian and London-based artists Sidsel Christensen and Ben Judd in 2011 in the KinoKino centre in Sandnes, Norway, explored notions of authenticity and belief, inviting viewer to have a first-hand experience of a world beyond the senses.
Christensen and Judd invited artists whose work helps to trace a historical overlapping in the development of the empirical and scientific with the irrational and mystical. The artists in the exhibition presented a duality of experience, by moving in-between a sceptical enquiry and a more internalised visionary engagement to explore the unknown.
Artists: Sidsel Christensen, Marcus Coates, Maya Deren, George Gurdjieff, Susan Hiller, Ben Judd, Hilma af Klint, Susan MacWilliam, Oscar Muñoz, Karen Russo (with Jeremy Millar, Shezad Dawood, Mark Titchner), Jane and Louise Wilson.
The catalogue contains transcript of a 2011 séance contacting the Swedish pioneer of abstract art and mystic Hilma af Klint (1862—1944; pages 16-23).
Publisher KinoKino Centre for Art and Film, Sandnes, Norway, 2011
56 pages
Joscelyn Godwin: Athanasius Kircher: A Renaissance Man and the Quest for Lost Knowledge (1979)
Filed under book | Tags: · 1600s, archaeology, history of science, history of technology, kabbalah, linguistics, magnetism, music, mysticism, optics, religion, science, technology
Athanasius Kircher (1602-80) stands out as one of the last all-encompassing minds, living in the age of Descartes and Newton, but expounding his knowledge in the light of a unified, spiritual world-view. For this true Renaissance man, the whole cosmos was a glorious theophany waiting to be explored.
Kircher was a Jesuit and an archeologist, a phenomenal linguist and an avid collector of scientific instruments and geographical exploration. He probed the secrets of the subterranean world, deciphered archaic languages, experimented with alchemy and music-therapy, optics and magnetism.
Egyptian mystery wisdom, Greek, Cabbalistic and Christian philosophy met on common ground in Kircher’s work; his sumptuous, encyclopaedic volumes were revered throughout Europe. His gigantic oeuvre is approached here through striking engravings – most of them reprinted for the first time – together with annotations and an introduction to Kircher’s life and work.
Publisher Thames & Hudson, 1979
Art and Imagination series
ISBN 0500810222, 9780500810224
96 pages
PDF (121 MB, no OCR)
Comment (0)Steven Shapin: The Scientific Revolution (1996)
Filed under book | Tags: · 1600s, history of science, knowledge production, natural philosophy, science, scientific revolution
“‘There was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book about it.’ With this provocative and apparently paradoxical claim, Steven Shapin begins his bold vibrant exploration of the origins of the modern scientific worldview.”
Publisher University of Chicago Press, 1996
Science.Culture series
ISBN 0226750205, 0226750213
xiv+218 pages
Reviews: Joseph E. Bauer (H-Net), Margaret J. Osler (Configurations), A.S. Weber (16th Century Journal), D. Bertoloni Meli (Early Science and Medicine), Robert Ward (Soundings).
PDF (updated on 2013-6-24, via Marcell Mars)
Comments (2)