4 x THROUGH THE LABYRINTH by O. Nicolai, J. Wenzel, Sadie Plant

Title: 4 x Through the Labyrinth
Author(s)/Editor(s): O. Nicolai, J. Wenzel, translated by Sadie Plant
Publisher: Spector Books / Rollo Press
Dimensions: 185 x 125 mm
Pages: 320
Format: softcover
Year: 2013

Why does Theseus slay the Minotaur? – Does one’s sense of direction improve, the more one knows? Or is it even harder to find the way when one knows how easy it is to get lost? – And how does the labyrinth make us so ready and willing to play its games? – Is the heart of this convoluted labyrinth so much easier to attain than the way back out to freedom? – Why can’t we escape its entanglements?

There are Many questions – and taking a direct approach doesn’t always find you the answer. Follow a trail full of wonders and unexpected twists turns.

The starting point for this transcript of four lectures, all held in Leipzig in 2010, is a public art work that Olaf Nicolai installed in Paris in 1998. By exploring and combining a broad spectrum of topics that relate to the theme of the labyrinth, this book serves as both, a reference system to Nicolai’s work as well as an independent source book dealing with labyrinthian matter ranging from the minotaur to the floorplans of IKEA.