Fear of the end of the world, and an ensuing appetite for ideas and images of paradise, often grow strong as centuries near their close, but in the 19th century this phenomenon had an earlier precedent in the literary works of Charles Baudelaire. A reference to this theme and to the poet was explicit in an exhibition called “Künstliche Paradiese” (Artificial paradise), curated by Zdenek Felix. Its title comes from Baudelaire’s Les Paradis artificiels (1860), and Felix makes mention of the poet in his catalogue introduction. Baudelaire had attempted, in his work and through his use of drugs, to