6 June 2013

Transfigured Night - Screening Thursday 13 June, 6pm - 7.30pm Whitechapel Gallery



Transfigured Night is the record of an exchange between the celebrated American philosopher Alphonso Lingis and the British art theorist and curator Adrian Heathfield. Drawn to conversation by reading Lingis’ numerous books, Heathfield pays a visit to the philosopher’s house near Baltimore where he discovers revealing dimensions of his ways of being and thinking. 

The film assembles a rich patchwork of fragments taken from their dialogue over a period of two days. Lingis makes dynamic forays into thoughts that have preoccupied him in over forty years as a writer and traveller, drawing on his influences in phenomenology and ethics, and his extensive encounters with many places and cultures. The discussion moves from questions of the face and the gaze of others, the sensual experiences of weight and being touched, through considerations of performance, sculpture and dance, to meditations on mortality and suffering. 

This is a world premiere of one of a series of screened conversations made by Heathfield in collaboration with the renowned photographer Hugo Glendinning.