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  • Gnostic Myth in Film - A Talk with Fryderyk Kwiatkowski
    2025/07/29

    For episode 15 of Pop Apocalypse, we welcome assistant professor, Fryderyk Kwiatkowski, on to discuss the relationship between ancient Gnostic myth and modern cinema. Fryderyk takes us through the impact European intellectuals 20:29 Carl Jung, Hans Jonas, and Eric Voegelin on popular conceptions of Gnosticism. We then dive into analyses of the Gnostic elements in films 34:34 like the Matrix, Dark City, Truman Show, and more recent cinema like Free Guy, Chappie, and the television series Silo.

    BIO
    Fryderyk Kwiatkowski is an Assistant at AGH University of Krakow. He earned a joint doctoral degree from the University of Groningen and the Jagiellonian University in 2023 with a thesis entitled Gnosticism in Hollywood: From European Academia to American Popular Culture. His research interests encompass the cultural reception of late antique esoteric traditions, their intersections with discourses on utopias and dystopias, and the (not-so-obvious) intertwinement of popular media, philosophy, and religion. He is currently developing a project on the role of imagination in contemporary technoculture, with a focus on the feedback loops between transhumanism, science fiction, and esotericism. He has published his research in venues such as Gnosis: Journal of Gnostic Studies, CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, Journal of Religion and Film.

    NOTES
    Fryderyk Kwiatkowski
    Academia.edu
    Gnosticism in Hollywood: From European Academia to American Popular Culture
    "Eric Voegelin and Gnostic Hollywood"
    "How to Attain Liberation from a False World? The Gnostic Myth of Sophia in Dark City."

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    1 時間 47 分
  • Madness, Mysticism, and Philosophy – A Talk with Wouter Kusters
    2025/07/02

    For episode 14 of Pop Apocalypse, we welcome the linguist and philosopher Wouter Kusters. Kusters is the author of Pure Madness (2004) and A Philosophy of Madness (2014), both of which won the Dutch Socrates Award for best philosophy book of the year. We discuss (5:26) how the experience of psychotic thinking challenges and illuminates our notions of language, philosophy, and mysticism. Along the way, we touch on the similarities between mystical and mad experiences, apophatic and psychotic uses of language, the phenomenology of time, and the impact of Kusters’ books on mental health specialists.

    Wouter Kusters, PhD, is a linguist and philosopher based in the Netherlands. Two of his books received the Dutch Socrates Award for the best and most inspiring philosophy book of the year: Pure Madness (2004) and A Philosophy of Madness (2014). The English version of this latter work was released in 2020 by MIT Press. In 2022, an Arabic version was released, and a Chinese translation is expected this year. Kusters writes on a range of themes in various outlets that explore perennial questions of meaning, madness, mysticism, and language.

    LINKS
    Wouter Kusters' homepage
    A Philosophy of Madness

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    1 時間 19 分
  • Photographing the Invisible: A Talk with Shannon Taggart
    2025/04/25

    For Episode 13 of Pop Apocalypse, we welcome Shannon Taggart, an American photographer, writer, researcher, and curator known for exploring how photography can navigate boundaries between the seen and unseen. Her book, Séance (Fulger Press, 2019), offers hundreds of photographs documenting contemporary Spiritualism across the U.S. and Britain. We discuss (3:26) what sparked Shannon’s interests in Spiritualism, the intersecting histories of photography and Spiritualism, ectoplasm, what inspires people to become mediums, and the techniques she developed for photographing the invisible.

    Shannon Taggart
    Website
    Seánce
    Lily Dale Symposium, 2025

    CSWR Events
    May 1, 6-8pm EDT: Peripheries Launch Event, Volume 7
    May 15-17: Thinking with Plants and Fungi Conference

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    1 時間 9 分
  • Black Metal and Orthodox Christianity - A Talk with Haela Ravenna Hunt-Hendrix of Liturgy
    2025/02/27

    For our 12th episode, we welcome the philosopher, artist, and musician Haela Ravenna Hunt-Hendrix. Haela is best known as the songwriter and singer behind the black metal band, Liturgy, which has released 1 EP and 6 full-length albums. We discuss Haela’s early relationships to Christianity and metal music, the growth of her philosophical interests, and her recent conversion to Orthodox Christianity. In the second part of our chat (42:33), we explore her philosophical system of Transcendental Qabalah and how it informs records such as H.A.Q.Q., Origin of the Alimonies, and 93696.

    LINKS
    Haela Ravenna Hunt-Hendrix
    Substack
    YouTube Channel
    "Transcendental Black Metal essay"

    Liturgy records
    H.A.Q.Q.
    Origin of the Alimonies
    93696

    References
    Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey Into Christian Hermeticism
    Deleuze and Guattari, Anti-Oedipus
    Sergius Bulgakov, The Sophiology of Death

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    1 時間 31 分
  • Women, Art, and the Spirit World - A Talk With Jennifer Higgie, Author of The Other Side
    2025/01/14

    For Episode 11 of Pop Apocalypse, we welcome Jennifer Higgie. Jennifer is the author of several books, including Bedlam, a novel about the artist Richard Dadd; The Mirror and the Palette, a history of women’s self-portraits; and The Other Side: A Story of Women in Art and the Spirit World, a beautiful and personal study of the relationship between spiritual experience and art in the lives of modern women. In this career-spanning chat, Jennifer and I discuss her early career in painting, what inspired her to write Bedlam, and how the art world changed during her time at Frieze magazine. Then we dive into Jennifer’s latest book, The Other Side: A Story of Women in Art and the Spirit World. We discuss the spiritual and artistic lives of women like Georgiana Houghton (20:35), Hilma af Klint (34:06), Ithell Colquhoun (46:09), and Hildegard of Bingen (52:53). Along the way, we touch on topics like fairies, Spiritualism, gardening, Carl Jung, spiritual ecology, Theosophy, ascended masters, angels, and much else.

    LINKS
    Jennifer Higgie
    The Other Side: Women, Art, and the Spirit World
    The Mirror and the Palette: Revolution, Rebellion, Resistance: 500 Years of Women's Self-Portraits
    Bedlam

    Others
    Georgiana Houghton's Evenings at Home in Spiritual Seánce
    Amy Hale's Ithell Colquhoun: Genius of the Fern Loved Gully
    Julia Voss's Hilma af Klint: A Biography

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    1 時間 15 分
  • Music and the Esoteric Imagination - A Talk with Trey Spruance of Mr. Bungle and Secret Chiefs 3
    2024/11/30

    For episode 10 of Pop Apocalypse, we welcome the musician, composer, and producer Trey Spruance. We discuss (3:42)Trey’s early musical and occult explorations and how reading the philosopher Henry Corbin changed the course of his life. Trey then takes us through the esoteric dimensions of Secret Chiefs 3 (22:59) and how albums like Book M and Book of Horizons are filled with correspondences to Kabbalah, astrology, Hermetic magic, and Pythagorean musicology. Along the way, we touch on Trey’s work with John Zorn and Kronos Quartet, his conversion to Eastern Orthodox Christianity, and the afterlives of Saint Cyprian the Mage.

    LINKS
    Web of Mimicry website
    Book M
    Book of Horizons
    Book of Souls: Folio A
    The Book Beri'ah, Vol. 10: Malkhut
    Xaphan: Book of Angels, Vol. 9
    Perichoresis
    Link to the G.I. Gurdjieff Conference at Harvard Divinity School, Dec 4-5th

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    1 時間 47 分
  • Religion, Technology, and Extraterrestrial Intelligences – A Talk with Diana Pasulka
    2024/10/30

    For episode nine, we welcome to the show Diana Pasulka, Professor of Religious Studies at UNC – Wilmington. Her books American Cosmic: UFOs, Religion, Technology and Encounters: Experiences with Nonhuman Intelligences are both classics in the field of Religion and Technology studies. We discuss how Pasulka’s early work on Catholic purgatory led her to the study of UFOs, the spiritual practices of experiencers, and the role of government (dis)information and popular culture in the rise of UFO religion. On the way, we touch on A.I., revelations, St. Teresa of Avila, sleep paralysis, and the perils and possibilities of new technologies.

    LINKS
    Diana Pasulka's Heaven Can Wait: Purgatory in Catholic Devotional and Popular Culture
    American Cosmic: UFOs, Religion, Technology
    Encounters: Experiences with Nonhuman Intelligences
    "From Purgatory to the UFO Phenomenon: The Catholic Supernatural Goes Galactic"
    Keith Cantu's Om-gnosis video podcast

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    1 時間 10 分
  • Dreams, Creativity, and Precognition – a talk with Eric Wargo
    2024/09/23

    For our eighth episode, we welcome the author Eric Wargo to the show. Eric is perhaps the world’s foremost expert on precognition. His most recent book, From Nowhere, examines precognition in its relationship to creativity in the lives of major authors and artists. We discuss the nature of time, dreamwork, memories from the future, and the four-dimensional brain. Along the way, we discuss figures like Virginia Woolf, Philip K. Dick, Andrei Tarkovsky, Sigmund Freud, and the sculptor, Michael Richards.

    NOTES

    Eric Wargo's work:

    • Blog "The Nightshirt"
    • From Nowhere: Artists, Writers, and the Precognitive Imagination
    • Time Loops
    • Precognitive Dreamwork and the Long Self: Interpreting Messages from Your Future

    An exhibit of Michael Richards' Sculpture

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    1 時間 48 分