The Dark Arts Research Group: Studies in Gothic, Horror and the Occult, 1750-Present

• Centre for Nineteenth-Century Studies International, Durham University
• International Nineteenth-Century Studies Association
• Recreational Fear Lab, Aarhus University
• The Copenhagen Centre for the Study of Theosophy and Esotericism.
• Gothica Network, University of Birmingham

The Rise of Popular Occulture in Europe

The project, funded by a small research grant from CEMES, aims is to explore the many ways that horror, gothic, and occultic topics have been communicated, presented, and packaged for broad audiences from the late eighteenth century to today. The project is especially interested in the ways different kinds of media technology, ranging from print and woodcut illustrations to photography and film have shaped conceptions of horror, gothic and the occult. The project is co-led by Efram Sera-Shriar and Robert Rix, with a planned conference to be hosted at Engerom in November 2023. See event

Monsters in the Nineteenth Century

With the publication of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), Richard Marsh’s The Beetle (1897), and Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), monsters became a staple of nineteenth-century literature. However, their hold on the nineteenth-century imagination runs far deeper. Gargoyles and grotesques adorn the exteriors of neo-Gothic churches; experiments with blood transfusion elicit fears of monstrous hybrids; in 1885, Punch published a cartoon satirising Ireland’s desire for Home Rule through the image of a vampire. From literature to architecture, and from the visual arts to medical and political discourse, monsters emerged as useful vehicles for articulating cultural anxieties, but also for making sense of a rapidly changing world. This online workshop on 31 October 2023, co-hosted by CNCSI and the Dark Arts Research Group at the University of Copenhagen, features a series of talks exploring the role played by monsters in the nineteenth century, investigating how their uncanny corporeality subverts dominant discourses and how therefore we might understand the monster as a valuable tool in uncovering hidden epistemologies in the study of the nineteenth century and its legacies. See event.

Film “Screaming” Event: Hellraiser

See event

On 24 May 2024 the Dark Arts Research Group at the University of Copenhagen and the Bloody Weekend are teaming up for their first ever “film screaming” event at Empire Bio in Nørrebro, Copenhagen. Heralded as one of the greatest horror films of all time, Hellraiser was based on Clive Barker’s chilling novella, The Hellbound Heart, from 1986. After solving a mystical puzzle box, the hedonist Frank Cotton inadvertently summons into the human world inter-dimensional sadomasochistic beings known as the Cenobites. After Frank is torn apart by these gruesome beings and transformed into a supernatural entity, a hellish story unfolds. Ever since its original release in 1987, Hellraiser's visceral exploration of human desires has echoed through the horror genre. From Pinhead’s menacing interpretation of human nature in the underworld to its exploration of body horror within the realm of sadomasochism, Hellraiser has encouraged the genre to go deeper into the darker aspect of the human psyche and sexuality.

Hellraiser was released in 1987 during the height of the Satanic Panic in the United States. This period witnessed a significant cultural clash between Christian conservatives worried about the moral and religious well-being of American youths and a growing counter-culture fascinated by the occult. There was a genuine concern by these conservatives that horror books and films like The Hellbound Heart and Hellraiser would lead young impressionable minds down dangerous paths toward Satanic worship. Prior to the screening, there will be a round-table discussion featuring researchers from the University of Copenhagen who will discuss the history of occultism in the United States, Lovecraftian fiction, and the era of Satanic Panic during the 1980s.

Otherworldly Entertainment

See Call for papers

Funded by the Carlsberg Foundation, the project explores the social significance of horror, magic and occult-themed videogames from 1980 to the present. Our aim is threefold: to host an international conference at the University of Copenhagen; to develop peer-reviewed publications; and to establish a research network to build further major projects, grant applications, and research activities in game studies.

Networks of Antiquity

See event

Co-funded by the European Union and the Carlsberg Foundation, the Networks of Antiquity project is a two-day interdisciplinary conference at the University of Copenhagen in May 2026, hosted by the Dark Arts Research Group. The project aims to bring together historians, literary scholars, religious studies scholars, and others to examine how antiquarian networks across Europe and beyond created porous cultural borders during the long eighteenth century. With the various inventive reimaginations of world mythologies, and as an oppressive vehicle for European imperial agendas, the study of vernacular antiquities during the long eighteenth century formed the critical foundations of contemporary worldviews via the lens of the past. Pre-dating Herder’s thesis about Volksgeist, these antiquarian practices already constituted a rewriting of histories, memories, and cultures, and brought to the fore questions of heritage, identity, empire, trade, as well as the value ascribed to language. Through this global trade of antiquity in all its forms —material, textual, visual—both national and local European perspectives were brought into dialogue with alternate histories and the legacy of bygone eras.