labyrinths – Page 2 – { feuilleton }

Cthulhu Labyrinth

Something I was working on last August when I was putting together new pictures for the Cthulhu calendar, I’d actually forgotten about this until this week. The idea was to do something that was more of an abstract design than the rest of the art; having got this far I was undecided whether I wanted to try and incorporate the labyrinth shape into a larger picture. With time running out and nothing resolved I ended up using the Keep Calm Cthulhu design which, looking back, I feel this alone could easily have replaced. (They both share the same Cthulhu glyph.) As it is I may make this one available as another CafePress design since it’s more suited to T-shirts and things. If it needs a justification then consider the story of The Call of Cthulhu as a labyrinthine investigation which reveals Cthulhu dreaming at its centre.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The Lovecraft archive

The labyrinth of Versailles

I ought to have mentioned this last week since a plan of the lost labyrinth of Versailles appears in the William Henry Matthews book. The labyrinth was completed for Louis XIV in 1677, and is unusual for being a series of paths without a central focus, and also a very ornamental affair containing thirty-nine fountains with accompanying statuary which depicted the animals from Aesop’s fables. The latter were a suggestion of Charles Perrault from whose Labyrinte de Versailles (1677) these illustrations are taken. The etchings are by Sébastian Le Clerc whose map shows the route that visitors would have taken in order to visit each fountain in turn. The book may be browsed here or downloaded here.

The labyrinth was removed in 1778 but Wikipedia has a page with more information including some colour prints of the fountains, and also an English list of the fables depicted.

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Maze and labyrinth panoramas

Parc del Laberint d’Horta, Barcelona by Valentin Arfire.

Continuing the maze and labyrinth theme, a selection of panoramas at 360Cities. Panoramic photography helps when viewing these constructions at a distance, especially when the camera is centrally positioned. The selection may be small but it shows how universal the urge is to build these things, with examples from Europe, the heart of Russia (where we learn that labyrinths are called “Babylons”) and China. Some of the pages have links to additional views. There’s a plan of the Parc del Laberint d’Horta hedge maze at Wikipedia.

Granite Maze, Kirchenlamitz, Bavaria by Martin Hertel.

Centre of the labyrinth (4 of 6), Castle Weldam, Netherlands by Jan Mulder.

“Vavilon” (Babylon) labyrinth, Kandalaksha District, Murmansk by Andrei Kuznetcov.

Labyrinth at the Uithof, the Hague by Marco den Herder.

Beijing Old Summer Palace 4, Labyrinth in Yuanmingyuan by Yunzen Liu.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The panoramas archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Mazes and labyrinths
• Labyrinths
• Jeppe Hein’s mirror labyrinth

Mazes and labyrinths

This book, Mazes and Labyrinths: A General Account of their History and Developments (1922) by William Henry Matthews, would have been very useful a couple of years ago when I was working on the cover design for Mike Shevdon’s The Road to Bedlam and required a labyrinth diagram. The one I used, a plan of Julian’s Bower in Alkborough, Lincolnshire, can be found below. I’ve had a lifelong interest in mazes and labyrinths so this book is fascinating beyond any temporary work requirements. Matthews’ study of the form features many diagrams going back to the legendary Cretan labyrinth and the constructions of the Ancient Egyptians. Closer to home there are depictions of the designs which flourished during the great era of landscape gardening in the 18th century, and photographs of some of Britain’s remaining turf mazes. The book may be browsed here or downloaded here.

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Jean Genet, 1981

Until watching Antoine Bourseiller’s film, the only interview I’d seen with Jean Genet was the one filmed by the BBC in 1985 in which a tetchy and evidently irritated Genet made a fool of interviewer Nigel Williams, and compared the whole experience to a police interrogation. (Williams and his interview are memorialised in Iain Sinclair’s Downriver with the words “Is he the one who made a cunt of himself with Genet?”)

Bourseiller’s 52-minute film is very different, presenting a warm and effusive writer who talks at length about lovers, friends (including Alberto Giacometti), posterity (which he dismisses), and his prison experiences. Between the interview sections there are readings from some of his texts. That this is as good as BBC films used to be shows what a wasted opportunity the actual BBC interview was. At the time it was impossible to tell whether Genet was simply a prickly character or whether Williams and company had severely pissed him off. Judged against Bourseiller’s film I’d bet on the latter.

(Note: The YouTube copy is in French but includes optional subtitles.)

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Un Chant d’Amour (nouveau)
• Jean Genet… ‘The Courtesy of Objects’
• Querelle again
• Saint Genet
• Emil Cadoo
• Exterface
• Penguin Labyrinths and the Thief’s Journal
• Un Chant D’Amour by Jean Genet