Were the monks on drugs? How The Book of Kells went fully psychedelic

Spirited to Ireland to save it from the Vikings, this wild illumination of the New Testament, full of gilded curls and coils, is one of the most ecstatic artworks ever – and now it’s gone gloriously immersive

What was going on in the minds of all those monks on Iona when, more than 1,000 years ago, they created the Book of Kells? Whatever they were fuelled by, they made an artistic masterpiece of medieval Christianity, up there with Durham Cathedral, the Palace of the Popes in Avignon, and the frescoes of Giotto. But it is older than any of these, and far stranger, one of the most ecstatic and psychedelic artworks ever created, an enchanted book that leads you on curling, coiling journeys of endless reverie in which a single letter in a word can become an object of obsession.

Now that waywardness has gone immersive. This already mighty exhibit, in the Old Library of Trinity College Dublin, has been transformed into The Book of Kells Experience, taking you inside its illuminated pages to uncover the manuscript’s history.

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