Published
TALKING TO A DEAD QUEEN
There is nothing higher in the human hierarchy than the position of the King, the bridge between Man and God, where the crowned head of the King represents the uppermost physical point in the vertical communication, a sender and a receiver of the exalted dialogue. The King has always been a focal point for the projection of the society’s aspirations and longings. The King’s role requires a mental somersault where the ego, I, gets transformed and, upon landing, fulfills the almighty, royal We. The King, being the chosen one with a supremacy bordering on divinity, naturally occupies the foremost position among humans with regards to the possibility of achieving exclusive immortality. “I want to rule the world!”, Napoleon is said to have said on his death bed. The role of the sovereign also represents the opposite of human shortcomings: human vulnerability gets balanced by the human supremacy.
In the history of lunacy, monarchs are more frequent than ever in the real world. The royal personage is also the symbol of the self, the protagonist of ego’s own projections. I am, naturally, the center of my own fantasies and mental journeys; I am, naturally, the hero of my own dreams. It is said that the socialization process involves the renouncement of the crown and the acceptance of one’s limitations. One abandons his “Kingdom” in order to become a human being, to be at one with his fellow men. Only fools and small children dwell in their castles, autocratic and alone. We remain always, however, in our subconscious and in our dreams, the ruler of the world. He who is all and everything, he who fills up Heaven and Earth. He who recreates the Creation and changes the course of the history…
In his diary from the imprisonment on St. Helena, Napoleon writes that on some fifteen occasions during his life, all on battlefields or on the eve of battles, he had vivid visions where one or several tall, luminescent copper poles were hanging in the empty void next to him. The poles, on all occasions, gave out a low, vibrating tone and shook as if in a feverish state. In these visions, the Emperor heard voices from the past (Amenhotep III, Caesar, Karl the Great, Karl XII, among others) introduce themselves and give their advice or comments in the presence of the approaching battles. Such characters that have been models and have formed a basis for Napoleon’s own way of thinking and acting, in both human and military aspects. These voices served him as guides and gave new dimensions in his offensive strategic thinking.
Talking to a Dead Queen is a simple attempt to imitate the circumstances in Napoleon’s visions by means of utilizing a thin, vibrating copper pipe connected to an amplifier and my own body as the influencer of the sound waves that fills the room.
Talking to a Dead Queen has its origin in Queen Christina’s post mortem record from Rome 1689.
Talking to a Dead Queen was recorded on November 2, 1994, during 60 minutes of intense concentration and with the purpose of attempting to establish contact with “the other side” – An attempt which has been captured on this CD and hereafter will be repeated and reattempted with each and every playback.