Friday Lates: Stilled shadows

From an early age and throughout his life, Joseph Wright of Derby was fascinated by the potential of the magic lantern, an early image projection device, which illuminated hand-painted slides onto a wall or screen by passing candlelight through a glass lens. Wright of Derby’s paintings that capture the play of light and shadow can even be compared to experiencing a magic lantern: both involve immersive participation, as communities gather around a candlelit spectacle, in a sense of childhood enchantment.

Drawing on the magic lantern slides held in Swedenborg House’s historic archive, the award-winning writer Chloe Aridjis presents her enchanting magic lantern performance, weaving new narratives and stories to long forgotten images and events. Photographs, scientific diagrams and painted scenes from the Victorian period are accompanied by a live score of spoken word and improvised music, exploring themes such as the passage of time, ghosts and the supernatural, travel and the natural world.

This event also marks the launch of Chloe’s new novel ‘The Shadow of the Object’, published by Chatto & Windus on 16 April 2026, which will be available to purchase on the evening.

Narrator: Chloe Aridjis

Lanternists: Jeremy and Carolyn Brooker

Pianist: James Keay

Clarinettist and accordionist: David Meredith

Chloe Aridjis is the author of ‘Book of Clouds’, which won the Prix du Premier Roman Étranger in France, ‘Asunder’, which tells the story of a museum guard at the National Gallery, and ‘Sea Monsters’, winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. She writes for various art journals and was a guest curator at Tate Liverpool, as well as previously contributing to the catalogue for our exhibition ‘Paula Rego: Crivelli's Garden’ in 2023. In 2014 she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her most recent book is the collection ‘Dialogue with a Somnambulist; Stories, Essays, and a Portrait Gallery’. She lives in London.