Transforming Darkness podcasts

The list of dark subtexts seems endless: from unform and uncolor over depression and anger to problematic notions of race and skin color. With anthropological perspectives you can approach darkness across a wide range of connotations without necessarily trying to pinpoint its essence, definition or boundaries but instead try to grasp how darkness has been mobilized by people, theories and political movements throughout history. Mankind has always been driven by the urge to explore the farthest, darkest corners of our realities, but maybe we don’t need to know all those things? Maybe darkness is for mystery?

To some people, darkness – mental as well as physical – is what seems to appear when life has no meaning. But through the philosophical approach of so-called existensial sensitivity, maybe we can actively withdraw to our darkness in order to transform from one psychological state to another. In a dialectic cosmology of light and darkness, we tend to associate light and cosmos where the dark is chaotic, however, darkness is needed for the world of light, the cosmos, to have a shape.

With Big Bang, the universe sent out light for the first time and since then there has been no actual darkness out there because photons, the light particles, can be caught at all wave lengths. However, the universe still contains the astrophysical paradox of dark matter, a missing mass, which can only be detected by looking at bright matter. This dark matter seem to have been present in the universe even before the Big Bang as an invisible pre-material – at the same time fundamental and incomprehensible. Without darkness we wouldn’t be able to see the light.

Blandt kvækkende frøer går Anders Laugesen ind i natten: Eksistensens urgrund, det, der var inden lyset, kontroltabet og overgivelsen. Ud af mørket viser livsretningen sig, det er kan være kærlighedens sted, det ydre mørke kan hele et indre mørke – hvis vi tillader os selv at se det.

“Materialet gemmer, ligesom havet, på enorme mængder af sæler”, og hvis man virkelig lytter til materialet kan man måske høre mørket komme skyllende. Dansen kan træde ind og agere i det sprogløse og udenfor sproget er mørket, så i bevægelsen kan kroppen nærme sig det eksistentielle mørke. En krop er et materiale der arbejder i det sanselige, og den japanske Butoh-dans er den måske tydeligste kropslige forløsning af mørke energier og stemninger som undertrykt seksualitet, vold, død og kaos.

Når en sans ikke bliver stimuleret begynder hjernen selv at sende signaler ud, og hvis du arbejder med en lav lysintensitet – i eksempelvis et totalt mørklagt teater – begynder dine øjne på et tidspunkt at se og ane former og fornemmelser. Vi er vant til at forbinde vores kroppe med synssansen, at forbinde vores kroppe med andre kroppe, men det fuldkomne mørke er måske det tætteste vi kommer på at være ude af vores krop?

Man kan ikke tale om mørke uden at tale om lys ligesom man ikke kan se lys uden at kende mørke – alle dele indgår i en helhed. Hvor grækerne var optagede af lys bevægede man sig i kristendommen over mod en stærkere kontrast mellem lys og mørke, frelse og synd. Med moderniseringen bliver særligt Vesten domineret af de oplysningstanker, der tydeligt prioriterer lyset. Vi lever i dag i en splittet tid, hvor nogle dyrker forstanden og dens rationelle lys, mens andre mærker kroppen og det formløses mørke. Men i det landskab mangler der måske et blik for spillet mellem det lyse og mørke – forudsætningen for den menneskelige erkendelse.

Når mennesket udsættes for totalt mørke forekommer fænomenet Eigengrau – hjernen vil ikke acceptere mørket og genererer derfor en nuance af grå, der forekommer sort. Det dybe, altomsluttende mørke er altså egentlig ikke tilgængeligt for menneskelige hjerner og øjne, men som alternativ kan dunkelheden være frugtbar for vores indre. Men hvis erfaringshorisonton og vores grundlæggende refleksionsrum udvides i de dunkle aspekter af virkeligheden, har århundreders oplysningsidealer måske indskrænket tankernes rækkevidde?

What happens with your mind when you expose your body to dense and long-term darkness? In 2017 Cathrine Poher developed a dancing performance in collaboration with chorepgrapher Thomas Eisenhardt which took place in total darkness. Starting from an ambition to reflect on present and future aspects of our global situation, their project stepped into the dark because of conceptual convergences between darkness and the future. We cannot imagine what we don’t know, we cannot see what has not yet appeared, and so what is ahead of us maybe indeed shares qualities with everything dark.

To some people, darkness – mental as well as physical – is what seems to appear when life has no meaning. But through the philosophical approach of so-called existensial sensitivity, maybe we can actively withdraw to our darkness in order to transform from one psychological state to another. In a dialectic cosmology of light and darkness, we tend to associate light and cosmos where the dark is chaotic, however, darkness is needed for the world of light, the cosmos, to have a shape.