- the labyrinth -
The Labyrinth
Ovid (in
Metamorphoses 8.161) notes that Daedalus built a house in which he
confused the usual passages and decieved the eye with a conflicting
maze of various wandering paths (1)
. Myriad strange, dark, and misleading passages are constructed to
create a labyrinth reminiscent of the labyrinth built by Deadalus. The
labyrinth is a web, or "rhizome": every path is connected with every
other one. It has no center, no periphery, and no actual exit because it is a
potential infinite. This labyrinth, however, does display some sort of linear
progression which is manifested in various ways.
The tunnels lead the participants through
various rooms that are built following an order that slowly progresses to what can be
considered as center and exit at once: the room where the minotaur reigns.
The progression to this point also follows a structure similar to what Dante uses in Inferno:
The tunnel is built in levels, starting from a broad level on the surface when first entering and progressing to deeper, steeper, and narrower spaces as one goes along.
An abstracted and simplified view of this structure is presented schematically below.
Click on the following image to view a wireframe plan of the entire labyrinth.
There are three main types of rooms encountered throughout the labyrinth:
rooms where its visitors are required to make choices as to where to proceed next,
rooms that resemble Borges' Library of Babel rooms, where all knowledge of the world is represented through books, and rooms that bring to life seven of Durer's woodcuts of the Apocalypse.
Some of these rooms are detailed below.
Selected spaces from the various sections of the labyrinth
Level One
Level Two
Level Three
Level Four
Level Five
Level Six & Seven
