James Turell & Rainer Maria Rilke

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James Turrell (1943-) is an American artist primarily concerned with light and space, known for his work in progress, Roden Crater — a natural cinder cone crater (Arizona) that he is turning into a massive naked-eye observatory. He has also worked as a pilot with over twelve thousand hours flying; maybe, that is why he considers the sky as his studio, material and canvas. New Yorker critic Calvin Tompkins writes, “His work is not about light, or a record of light; it is light — the physical presence of light made manifest in sensory form.”

Fargo, Blue, 1967

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Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) was a Bohemian-Austrian poet and novelist, widely recognized as one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets. Several critics have described Rilke's work as inherently "mystical." His writings include one novel, several collections of poetry, and several volumes of correspondence in which he invokes haunting images that focus on the difficulty of communion with the ineffable in an age of disbelief, solitude, and profound anxiety. These deeply existential themes tend to position him as a transitional figure between the traditional and the modernist writers.

"You, darkness, that I come from"

You, darkness, that I come from
I love you more than all the fires
that fence in the world, 
for the fire makes a circle of light for everyone
and then no one outside learns of you. 

But the darkness pulls in everything —
shapes and fires, animals and myself, 
how easily it gathers them! —
powers and people-

and it is possible a great presence is moving near me. I have faith in nights. 

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Connection between the two works of art

Both authors are fascinated by the contrast (and by the coexistence) of darkness and light, by this mystery that brings the unique experience of transcendence. One is therefore invited to step out of his/her comfort zone to enter the darkness, in order to get to know him/herself better. As human beings, we are naturally scared of dark, of the unknown. To face darkness means to suspend for a moment our effort to control everything around us, to gain a new knowledge and to gain an experience that might make our perception of the world different.

Patrícia Proksová