Piranesi Vk |best|

The novel pits two opposing epistemologies against each other. The Other represents the corrupt, acquisitive side of the Enlightenment: he seeks the “Great and Secret Knowledge” of the House’s creator, believing that it can be owned, weaponized, and used for power. He is a magician in the worst sense—one who imprisons and dissects. Piranesi, conversely, represents a humble, participatory knowledge. He learns the House not by conquering it but by loving it. His knowledge is experiential: he knows the moods of the tides in his bones; he recognizes the Statues as friends. Clarke suggests that the former type of knowledge (arrogant, extractive) leads to madness and cruelty, as seen in the fate of previous victims like the so-called “Prophet” (Benedict Ketterley). The latter type (respectful, aesthetic) leads to wholeness.

Here’s a feature-style piece on — conceived as a fictional or conceptual digital artist / world-builder active on VK (Russia’s social network), blending the labyrinthine imagination of Susanna Clarke’s Piranesi with the raw, communal energy of Eastern European internet culture. Piranesi Vk