Alternatives to transcendental experience in art culture of Europe

The alternatives to the off-sacred transcendency in the creative practice and life forming strategies immanent to the representives of European romanticism, decadance and art bohemia in the 19th century and first half of the 20th century are shown. The major symbolic texts by T. de Quincey, Charles Baudelaire and Aldous Huxley were analyzed which ideologically legitimized the concept of the use of the psychotropic drugs. The author also defines the borders of ethical, existential, artistic and aesthetical evaluation of these practices among European bohemia on the transition from the 19th to the 20th century. The attempt of Aldous Huxley to rationally and empirically comprehend with the effect, produced by psychotropic drugs, beyond medicinal and psychological aspects, as described in his book «The Doors of Perception», was most scrupulously examined. The article demonstrates how the Huxley’s experiment is questioning the verity and totality of the currently dominating concept of reality and the methods of its perception. The author also pointed out the great impact of «The Doors of Perception» on the global culture of the second half of the 20th century.