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.