This installation stages a stark philosophical scene: a solitary black chair stands on a white platform, facing a glowing lightbox bearing the phrase “DAS NICHTS NICHTET”. Along the edge of the platform, the French inscription “Cours de métaphysique avancée” (Advanced Metaphysics Course) introduces a subtle irony.
The title is drawn from Martin Heidegger’s seminal 1929 lecture What is Metaphysics?, in which he asserts that the Nothing (das Nichts) is not mere absence, but something that “nihilates” — it nothings. In Heidegger’s thought, the Nothing plays a crucial ontological role: it discloses Being by confronting Dasein with the possibility of meaninglessness.
The black chair represents the absent spectator or student, evoking an atmosphere of existential quietude: an advanced metaphysics course without lecturer, without content — only the confrontation with absence, with light, with the word.
Positioned between philosophical diagram and silent theater, the work invites reflection on the active role of Nothingness in our experience of Being, and on the strange intimacy between language, void, and presence.