The book at the crossroads of consciousness

This exhibition opened on July 28th and continues to October 20, 2018. 

The exhibit reflects on the importance of the written word at the dawn of the internet era. It is also a meditation on literacy and cultural identity – especially in regards to Canada and Iceland.

Fleyg orð, or Words in Flight, is a series of works by Guy Stewart.

The exhibition Fleyg orð features a kite book, the pages of which depict oral works from pre-literate times which survive today as texts, such as the Icelandic Úlfhams Saga. The work embodies the liberation of literacy. Just as flying a kite isn’t the same as experiencing actual bodily flight, it gives an intimation of actual flight. There is value in this: the imagination is powerfully enhanced. And while reading a book isn’t the actual experience related in the narrative – it is a virtual experience, through the liberated faculty of the imagination.

Icelandic culture has made unique contributions in the transition from ancient oral myth into the imaginative flowering of its mediaeval literature, and thus figures prominently in the kite book.

What is gained and what is lost, in the oral-literate transition? And in our own time, what is lost and gained in the transition from literacy, as we have understood it in print; to the glowing screen of the interactive internet?