Spiral Out: A Genealogy of Coincidentia Oppositorum in Twentieth-century Art and Literature
Video Arts & Humanities 2025 Graduate ExhibitionPresentation by Daniela Farkas
Exhibition Number 520
Abstract
The coincidentia oppositorum, or coincidence/unity of opposites, is an ancient idea that in the west dates to the Greek pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus. The concept also has Eastern correlates, for instance in the Taoist philosophy attributed to ancient Chinese philosopher Laozi. Coincidentia oppositorum concern the ways existence is composed of opposites. As the eighteenth-century British romantic poet William Blake wrote, “Without Contraries is no progression. Attraction and Repulsion, Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence.” My dissertation focuses on the decades following World War II in the Americas, when a variety of English and Spanish speaking writers and artists turned to the wisdom of uniting opposites to address their times most pressing philosophical and ethical concerns. In the wake of World War II, the creators I examine struggled with the potential for good and evil in science, the need for pragmatism and spiritual wisdom in politics, and the role of artists and authors in bringing such opposites together. These creators, ranging from Argentine writer Ernesto Sábato, Spanish artist Remedios Varo to American poet Robert Duncan, theologian Thomas Altizer, and Chicana writer Gloria Anzaldúa, all found perennial wisdom in the unity of opposites and forged ideas, art, and stories that reflect this wisdom. My project considers how these artists and authors made use of the ideas of figures like Swiss psychologist Carl Jung and Romanian historian Mircea Eliade, as well as revivals of religious discourses, mysticism, occultism, and spirituality in the twentieth century.
Importance
My project charts an influential yet scarcely acknowledged trend in twentieth-century philosophy and art. Current approaches in literary studies are predominantly influenced by philosophical traditions that are concerned with power relations, are skeptical of meaning and critical of traditional humanism—attitudes that were fostered in the intellectual atmospheres of a devastated post-World War II Europe. My project illuminates alternatives to such approaches to art and literature, alternatives that draw from humanist traditions (ancient literatures, religious discourses, early modern and medieval sciences) and remain influential, though often unacknowledged, today. My project tracks this spiritual and romantic alternative to postwar nihilism through the intellectuals, scientists, writers and artists who pioneered it.