thesis
A week of initiation
The planned environment and sensory landscape of the Everness Festival in light of Hungarian and international esoteric trends
The aim of my thesis is to explore, in depth, the Hungarian esoteric milieu and the spiritual festival scene and provide a structural analysis from the perspective of material culture and broadly interpreted design. To narrow down the topic, my research focuses on an essential manifestation of Hungarian syncretism, the Everness Festival. In the first part of the thesis, I analyse alternative spirituality systematically and from the perspective of the sociology of religion, and I discuss the concept of spiritual tourism in detail. This is followed by the thematic analysis of the sensory landscape of the Everness Festival, discussing material and spatial relationships, designed liminality, religious phenomenology and the ecstatic experiences sparked by the environment that is based on complex and multisensory planning. My aim is to draw a conclusion that discusses the relationship between the design culture and the financial structure of alternative spirituality.