The Red Book

NY Times posted some interesting news about the upcoming publication of psychologist Carl Jung's secret, private, psychic exploration book, the Red Book. I'm really looking fwd to perusing this book as it looks really interesting, just the paintings alone hold a fascination. It does give one pause to consider the publication of this much guarded, very private book. It was, as Jung describes it, his soul. What happens when it enters a capitalist system to be made a commodity for all to buy? Or is it to the benefit and enrichment of society that such a seminal work will be available to inspire others to explore their inner worlds?

From the article:

"about halfway through the Red Book — after he has traversed a desert, scrambled up mountains, carried God on his back, committed murder, visited hell; and after he has had long and inconclusive talks with his guru, Philemon, a man with bullhorns and a long beard who flaps around on kingfisher wings — Jung is feeling understandably tired and insane. This is when his soul, a female figure who surfaces periodically throughout the book, shows up again. She tells him not to fear madness but to accept it, even to tap into it as a source of creativity. “If you want to find paths, you should also not spurn madness, since it makes up such a great part of your nature.”

The Red Book is not an easy journey — it wasn’t for Jung, it wasn’t for his family, nor for Shamdasani, and neither will it be for readers. The book is bombastic, baroque and like so much else about Carl Jung, a willful oddity, synched with an antediluvian and mystical reality. The text is dense, often poetic, always strange. The art is arresting and also strange. Even today, its publication feels risky, like an exposure. But then again, it is possible Jung intended it as such. In 1959, after having left the book more or less untouched for 30 or so years, he penned a brief epilogue, acknowledging the central dilemma in considering the book’s fate. “To the superficial observer,” he wrote, “it will appear like madness.” Yet the very fact he wrote an epilogue seems to indicate that he trusted his words would someday find the right audience."

The actual book itself will be making an appearance on New York soil when it will be shown at the Rubin Museum.

In the spirit of RMA's exhibition The Red Book of C.G. Jung, personalities from all walks of life--including performance artist Marina Abramovic, film director John Boorman, actress Kathleen Chalfant, entrepreneur Robin Chase, writer and activist David Harvey, graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister, painter Philip Taaffe, Tibet scholar Robert Thurman, novelist Gloria Vanderbilt, and many others--will be paired on stage with a psychoanalyst and invited to free associate, using a folio from Jung's Red Book as a starting point. The pair will then explore in conversation the themes that develop.