They were four magical days. The Auroville Film Institute organized a residency with Ustad Bahauddin Dagar from November 7th to 10th, 2022. It took place in the Bhumika Hall, Bharat Nivas Auroville. Dhrupad – The Film (1983). Ustad Bahauddin Dagar is a Rudraveena player. His family has been playing the instrument for 20 generations! His father and uncle (Zia Mohiyuddin Dagar and Fariduddin Dagar) were true masters. There is also the wonderful film Dhrupad by the Indian director Mani Kaul. Mani Kaul…
Curry! Every morning there are wonderfully mild Indian dishes. They are light and complex, with what seems like a thousand and one spices. Lunch is Solarkitchen, the community canteen, simple, good vegetarian food. The principle is healthy food for everyone, affordable for all. In the evening, those wonderful dishes again. What's not available: alcohol, meat, or fish, sugar. Eggs are a luxury. I used to eat a lot of chocolate in Germany, but now it's far too sweet for me. I treat myself to a complex vitamin...
Yesterday, after many years, I finally drove to the village center of Roubion. Vilém Flusser lived here for many years. I often quoted his books in my seminars and used them as a basis for discussion. Especially his philosophy of photography. Flusser is a wild theorist. He wrote a lot about images, media, language, technology, signs, history... It seems to me that he repeatedly thought about how thinking works. How do words and images arise in our heads and how much does that have to do with...
Our brain is not the seat of our mind, but the medium through which we can reach the spiritual. When I first heard this many years ago at a conference on media theory, I was astonished. Did they really mean it? Is that crazy or brilliant? There is this beautiful old-fashioned word, ‚subtle.‘ Our body is a medium through which we can reach this. Our media theories are generally conceived in a technological way. There is...
During meditation, I often observe my thinking, letting thoughts come and go, and try to slow down the thinking process. Thoughts come and go, and I often don't understand where they come from, or why they are eventually replaced by a completely different thought. What chain of association is at work there? These chains of thought seem random, triggered by experiences that are still resonating and being processed. This reminds me of a philosophical idea. It begins with an observation by Henri Bergson…
It is now definitely time to rethink. What our fathers and grandfathers called progress is destroying our planet. Science is not an end in itself, not everything that is technically feasible is good, not everything that is fun and satisfies our senses is meaningful. Now we hear from many sides repeatedly to concentrate on the small steps ahead, and that only then will we move forward together. This may be right occasionally, but it distracts from what is essential. Where do we actually want to go? Power…
I'm sitting in a café in France. There's lively chatter all around me. This morning I was ‚on the internet‘. How different these experiences are. Of course, pears aren't easily compared to apples, and yet we often do it. Working in an office and working from home, for example, are similar; seeking community on social networks or in a café, for example; reading in a library or researching on the internet. These are apples and pears, similar and yet categorically different. On the internet, we are...
When the internet became publicly accessible, meaning in the mid-90s, there was the phenomenon of people putting their deepest secrets online. The anonymity, the simplicity, and the speed were alluring. The confession was quickly made, anonymity largely preserved, and perhaps there was even that little thrill that someone one knows might be reading the secrets without knowing who was behind them. These tele-confessions were cathartic. Today, it has reversed: everyone is supposed to see what you're doing, without noticing...
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