LESSONS in the SHADOWS of DEATH by Laasonen Belgrano, Price, Hjälm, Carlsson Redell, Ideström

The research project 'Lessons in the Shadows of Death' explores and exposes an almost lost tradition of public mourning - the Art of Lamentation. The project follows the structure of the 17th century musical genre 'Leçons de Ténèbres' – traditionally composed as vocal ‘lessons’ performed during Easter week contemplating the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC and based on the Biblical Lamentations. The overall purpose is to create and promote an intra-active 'grief-entangled' music practice in relation to public mourning and wounds of loss. Previous artistic research on vocal mad scenes, lamentations and Nothingness (Laasonen Belgrano 2011) and performance philosophical explorations of apophenia and autopoesis (Price 2017) has since 2019 merged and developed into a growing archive investigating ‘ornamentation-as methodology’. The primary aim of this project is to transform the ornamented music and words of Michel Lambert’s nine Leçons de Tenebres from 1661 into nine video-essays. Together with an international network of artists and scholars we will bring the 17th century musical mourning to a contemporary Jerusalem – a city which lives as a symbol of any falling, wounded and embodied space-time. The project reconfigures the Art of Lamentation as a living practice for a wounded world in need of re-learning how to attend to existential consciousness and communal grief.The research project 'Lessons in the Shadows of Death' explores and exposes an almost lost tradition of public mourning - the Art of Lamentation. The project follows the structure of the 17th century musical genre 'Leçons de Ténèbres' – traditionally composed as vocal ‘lessons’ performed during Easter week contemplating the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC and based on the Biblical Lamentations. The overall purpose is to create and promote an intra-active 'grief-entangled' music practice in relation to public mourning and wounds of loss. Previous artistic research on vocal mad scenes, lamentations and Nothingness (Laasonen Belgrano 2011) and performance philosophical explorations of apophenia and autopoesis (Price 2017) has since 2019 merged and developed into a growing archive investigating ‘ornamentation-as methodology’. The primary aim of this project is to transform the ornamented music and words of Michel Lambert’s nine Leçons de Tenebres from 1661 into nine video-essays. Together with an international network of artists and scholars we will bring the 17th century musical mourning to a contemporary Jerusalem – a city which lives as a symbol of any falling, wounded and embodied space-time. The project reconfigures the Art of Lamentation as a living practice for a wounded world in need of re-learning how to attend to existential consciousness and communal grief.

LESSONS in the SHADOWS of DEATH - Introduction

1^st lesson

The aim of this project is to explore experiences of entangling between heaven and earth; between two notes; between two beings; between hate and love; between expiration and dinspiration; between exile and home; between living and dying. Between All and Nothing.

It all begins with French Composer Michel Lambert's vocal meditation Léçon de Ténèbres ( c. 1661) performed at the court of Louis XiV during Easter week. Texts brought from the Book of Lamentation (Hebrew bible / Old Testament).

the story is an entangled meditation about all the worst one can ever iimagine, There is pain, blood, exile, outcasting, humility, all so awful it can only be forgotten (Lindal et al. ,ongoing). driven towards the river Cocytus, where the water is salty ...

Gravkyrkan/Heliga gravens kyrka/Uppståndelsekyrkan/Anastasis:

detta är den viktigaste platsen på jorden för kristenheten. Golgata. Beredelsestenen. Kristi grav. Kanske är det här himmel och jord möts? Men också en plats där religionens och den sekulära världens behov gnisslar mot varandra. Pilgrimer gråter och klagar vid graven. Turisterna fotograferar. Munkarna skäller på den som är för långsam inne i graven. Finns det tid för (religiös) sorg i Iphonens epok?

Church of the Holy Sepulcher/Church of the Resurrection/Anastasis:

this is the most important place on earth for Christendom. Calvary. The preparation stone. Tomb of Christ. Maybe this is heaven and earth meeting? But also a place where the needs of religion and the secular world squeak against each other. Pilgrims weep and complain at the tomb. The tourists take pictures. The monks scold anyone who is too slow inside the tomb. Is there time for (religious) mourning in the age of the iPhone?

2^nd lesson

Dominus Flevit:

”Herren grät” (Luk 19:37-42). Litet kapell strax ovanför Getsemane på Olivberget. Byggt på 1950-talet, med utsikt över Gamla sta’n. Min vän brukar kalla den ”den välsignade platsen”. Kanske för att ljuset över staden aldrig är så vackert som sett härifrån.

Dominus Flevit:

"The Lord wept" (Luke 19:37-42). Small chapel just above Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives. Built in the 1950s, with a view of the Old Town. My friend usually calls it "the blessed place". Maybe because the light over the city is never as beautiful as seen from here.

Separationsmuren:

i Abu Diz, eller vid Bethlehem, eller norr om staden vid Kallandia. Skriket som muren hela tiden lockar fram – det får inte vara såhär! Muren är, för mig, en fysisk klagovisa. Ett ständigt återrop – ett eko - av mänskligt misslyckande.

The Separation Wall:

at Abu Diz, or at Bethlehem, or north of the city at Kallandia. The scream that the wall constantly evokes - it must not be like this! The wall is, for me, a physical complaint. A constant echo - an echo - of human failure.

3^rd lesson

4^th lesson

Lazarus grav:

på Olivbergets östra sluttning, på ”andra sidan” separationsmuren, ligger byn al-Eizariya. Idag en fattig, övergiven stadsdel – en hård plats där den politiska situationen isolerat människor. Här ligger den traitionella pilgrimsplatsen för Lazarus grav (känd och aktad sedan 400-talet vad jag förstår). Här uppstod Lazarus enligt Johannesevangeliet. Detta är en svår plats, tycker jag, där död/uppståndelse/nutida förtvivlan/avskärmning/hopplöshet samsas. Så komplext uppfattar jag narrative här att klagovisor nog är det enda som kan sägas… Helig för kristna och muslimer.

Tomb of Lazarus:

on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, on the "other side" of the separation wall, lies the village of al-Eizariya. Today a poor, abandoned neighborhood - a harsh place where the political situation isolated people. Here is the traditional pilgrimage site for the tomb of Lazarus (known and respected since the 4th century as far as I understand). Here Lazarus arose according to the Gospel of John. This is a difficult place, I think, where death/resurrection/contemporary despair/foreclosure/hopelessness come together. I perceive the narrative here to be so complex that laments are probably the only thing that can be said... Holy for Christians and Muslims.

Yad Vashem – the World Holocaust Remembrance Center:

sorgen som bor här. Att komma hit för att gråta över dem som togs ifrån mänskligheten. Över ondskan. Över det som aldrig fick bli, som uteblev.

Yad Vashem – the World Holocaust Remembrance Center:

the sadness that lives here. To come here to weep for those who were taken from humanity. Over evil. Over what was never meant to be, what didn't happen.

5^th lesson

Gehenna/Hinnondalen:

precis söder/sydväst om stadsmuren går dalgången Hinnon eller Gehenna. Plats för barnoffer (jfm Molok) och förbannad av profeten Jeremiah (Jeremiah 7, 19). I rabbinsk litteratur ledde vissa synder till att man kastades i Gehenna. I dalgången finns Blodsåkern eller Akeldama och möjligen är detta platsen som avses med ”dödsskuggans dal”.

Gehenna/Hinnon Valley:

just south/southwest of the city wall runs the valley of Hinnon or Gehenna. Place of child sacrifice (cf. Moloch) and cursed by the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 7, 19). In rabbinic literature, certain sins led to one being cast into Gehenna. In the valley there is Blodsåkern or Akeldama and possibly this is the place referred to by the "valley of the shadow of death".

6^th lesson

7^th lesson

Västra muren:

på svenska kallades den länge ”Klagomuren”, på engelska ”Wailing wall”. Numera används inte de begreppen, men det är svårt att tänka sig att inte inkludera den här platsen i ett arbete kring Klagovisorna. Här är man nära det allra heligaste, men trots det en bit bort. Ett avstånd. Ett mellanrum mellan människan och Gud. Är detta en del av att ”ingen kan se Gud och leva.”? En ’geografisk säkerhetszon’ mot det gudomliga?

Western Wall:

in Swedish it was long called "Klagomuren", in English "Wailing wall" (or Wall of lamentations). These terms are not used nowadays, but it is hard to imagine not including this place in a work on the Lamentations. Here you are close to the holiest, but still a bit away. A distance. A gap between man and God. Is this part of "no one can see God and live."? A 'geographical safety zone' against the divine?

8^th lesson

Lifta:

Lifta var en palestinsk by i Jerusalems utkant som övergavs/tömdes 1947-48. Större delen av byns stenbyggnader förstördes, men ännu kan man se ett antal av byns hus – som ruiner på sluttningarna. En viktig påminnelse om en plats och ett folk som fått lämna, eller ett onödigt och ointressant förflutet som borde jämnas med marken? Åsikterna går isär. Vad gör man när någons klagan är någon annans framgång?

Lifta

Lifta was a Palestinian village on the outskirts of Jerusalem that was abandoned/emptied in 1947-48. Most of the village's stone buildings were destroyed, but you can still see a number of the village houses - as ruins on the slopes. An important reminder of a place and a people that had to leave, or an unnecessary and uninteresting past that should be razed to the ground? Opinions differ. What do you do when someone's complaint is someone else's success?

9^th lesson

Marias grav:

vid foten av Olivberget, helt nära Getsemane. En bred trappa leder ned i underjorden. Platsen är ortodoxt kristen, med rökelsekar hängande från taket. Det är vackert och sorgligt. En stilla grav. Kanske är detta platsen klagandet slutligen klingar ut?

Mary's grave.

At the foot of the Mount of Olives, close to the garden of Getsemane. A stariway down into the underworld.The place is Christian Ortodox, with insense hanging from the ceiling. It is beautiful and sorrowful. A quiet grave. Perhaps the place where the sound is slowly tuning out.

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