Erogenous Zones of Reality: Lifshitz and Materialistic Kabbalah. Yoel Regev talks to Dmitri Gutov

As a part of the public program accompanying the exhibition If our soup can could speak: Mikhail Lifshitz and the Soviet sixties a discussion will take place between Yoel Regev and Dmitry Gutov of the possible connections of his thoughts with radical movements in Jewish mysticism.

“This means that our mind, being true to its definition, should actively seek in reality points charged with universality…” This phrase of Mikhail Lifshitz, which essentially summarizes his approach to idealism and his interpretation of materialist aesthetics, correlates in a strange way with Kabbalistic-Hasidic strategies of “seeking points of holiness” in the worlds of “impurity” and “externality” in order to “clarify” and “elevate” them. It is not a case of a chance parallel or a historical-cultural “influence”, but of a common epistemological field.

This discussion has been initiated by the Eshkolot Project, which is supported by The Genesis Philanthropy Group.