The Ritual of the Snake

What images can speak today of the Absolute in a universal way? Aby Warburg's legendary journey among the native tribes of North America—an experience reported in the famous 1923 conference on the “Serpent Ritual,” which in 1939 appeared in the Warburg Institute's “Journal,” and later became the scholar's spiritual testament—represents the emotional and cultural reference behind a collection of 80 images, selected by eight artists and eight curators, dedicated to the identification and construction of a personal and collective imaginary. The power of images, of which Warburg investigated the origins in magic rituals and in spiritual and pagan celebrations, is given back here through the explorations of the authors involved, who, thanks to a variety of experiences and of historical, personal and cultural references, go through the kaleidoscopic landscape of contemporary iconography.