The Riddle of Lumen

The Riddle of Lumen, similarly, is less an inventory of emotions than an inventory of different kinds of light -- though individual images can also have emotional implications, of course. But Brakhage edits the film to undercut, even deny, the kinds of obvious unities achieved by cutting on common shapes or similar movements that organized many of his earlier films. The effect of this editing is to constitute each individual image, each variety of light, as a kind of irreducible mystery. (Fred Camper)