#the project was to create a product or ritual for a specific situation | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

astrojulia · 1 year

Text

PAC - Messages to improve your Summer/Winter Season

Navigation: ੈ♡˳Masterlist

ੈ♡˳Askbox ੈ♡˳Sources

DISCLAIMER. These general free readings are made in good faith for entertainment purpose. This reading was done in mind with Summer for people in the Northern Hemisphere and Winter for the Southern Hemisphere.

How to pick a pile

When you have different cards to choose from in pile 1,2,3… look at each of those cards. Wait until someone reminds you of a memory. Perhaps a character’s outfit resembles one of your own. It is this pile that has its message. What if they all remind me of something? Go for the one with the strongest memory, one might look like her earring but another might be the favorite candy you got from your grandma when you vacationed at her house. But what if none reminds me of something? Take a deep breath and wait a little longer, without charging yourself or creating worries. Relax, some will awaken some memory in you, I promise! ..

Pile 1 - Kuromi

(Eight of Coins - Ships - 10 of Wands - Moon - The Moon - Lillies - Nightingale)

What you've been working on since the beginning of the year has been your work and your career, and that's why you've already made great progress in this regard. You've completed many plans and projects because I see here a person who engages in independent and primarily artistic work (if this doesn't apply to you, skip this part). You've already made significant changes to the way you approach your projects, perfecting them and improving their efficiency in terms of time and cost.

Your strength today lies primarily with women and the female audience. It seems that you make their work much easier by delivering practically everything ready. So far, this description has been quite general, but let me delve deeper. You have the ability to take sketches and text that people create and turn them into highly detailed images. You can deliver exactly what they want, even when they don't fully understand their own desires.

In the remainder of the year, you need to focus on enhancing your creativity, intuition, and subconscious. It appears that you have concentrated on improving the theoretical and logical aspects of your art, such as techniques. However, now it's time to reestablish your focus on the practical and emotional dimensions of your craft. Understand the messages behind your work without needing explanations or logical reasoning, as there are certain aspects that are purely emotional and not rational.

Pile 2 -My Melody

(The Fool - Mices - Two of Cups - Tree - The Hierophant - Whip - Turkey)

What you've been working on since the beginning of the year is exploring the possibilities at your disposal. You haven't limited yourself to a single plan or envisioned a fixed future; instead, you've been experimenting and getting to know a little bit of everything. You have conducted extensive research, seeking out both the purest and darkest aspects of each subject. During this period, you haven't settled for anything less—you have immersed yourself in the topic and then moved on. This research and exploration are closely connected to the magical, religious, and alchemical aspects of things.

Your strength lies in your ability to transform situations like turning water into wine. You have a knack for converting adversity into productivity and fruitful outcomes. For you, there is no such thing as a bad time. This ability is particularly evident when it comes to your parents and ancestors—you have a way of making their influence more adaptable.

In the remaining part of the year, it is important to focus and commit to a specific area. Although you have conducted extensive research, it's time to concentrate on a particular subject to delve deeper and produce something that can benefit you in the long-term future. You need to create a ritual, something you can talk about and engage with every day, starting from the moment you wake up in the morning.

Pile 3 - Hello Kitty

(Ace of Pentacles - Child - The Chariot - Bear - Four of Pentacles - Dog - Skunk)

You have been focusing on personal growth and the experiences that money can afford you. You have been meeting your child's wants and basic needs to a certain extent. For instance, if you can buy a snack, you go ahead and purchase it without holding back. However, you have imposed significant restrictions on yourself, and now you are starting to loosen up a bit. Additionally, you have been rediscovering and utilizing skills from your childhood that were once set aside due to financial constraints, but now you have the means to pursue them.

Your greatest strength today lies in your audacity and courage. Nothing and no one can stand in your way. You are also deeply connected to spirituality, particularly embracing a feminine and motherly energy. Your inner light and unwavering faith that everything will eventually fall into place are your sources of strength.

As you move forward in the remaining part of the year, it is important to focus on your economy and practice saving. Cultivate a greater appreciation and care for the possessions you already have. Lately, you have been driven by instinct, and it would be beneficial to incorporate a bit more rationality into your decision-making for the remainder of the year.

(CC) AstroJulia Some Rights Reserved

#astrojulia #witchblr #astroblr #astro community #tarot #tarot reading #tarotblr #divination #pac #pick a pile #pick a card #tarot witch #oracle reading

143 notes · View notes

who-is-page · 2 years

Text

(I Always Kill) The Things I Love: How I Navigate Ethical Relationships with Food as a Carnivore

Author: Page

Type: Essay

Words: 1,725

Summary: How Page navigates his relationship with food and ethics as a canine psychopomp.

Author's Note: Trigger warning for animal death mentions. The title is also a reference to the song "(I Always Kill) The Things I Love" by the Real Tuesday Weld from the Last Werewolf book series soundtrack.

[Part of the Sol System’s Alterhuman Writing Project for NaNoWriMo 2021. If you don’t want to see these posts, block the tag #inkedpaws]

As many already know, I’m a canine psychopomp: a glorified magical hunting dog that’s tasked with hunting down the unruly deceased and dragging their souls back to wherever they’re supposed to be. Being that I’m a large, arguably tamed but not domesticated, canine who was bred or otherwise created for a specific predatory purpose in mind, that means I have both a hyper-active prey drive and an extremely heavy lean towards meat-heavy diets.

With that said, existing in a human body as a canine doesn’t negate the responsibilities I have as a global citizen when it comes to sustainability and ethics of consumption and food. In some ways, it actually makes me feel as though I have to pay closer attention to the fine details of such, because I’ve already given my place on the food chain and my perspectives on environmentalism so much thought. The relationship people have to food is also a subject that gets brought up in my field a fair bit: some scholars theorize that food is inherently religious or spiritual in that it's essential to our forms of ritual and the ways we perceive ourselves and others, with people even going so far as to theorize that “it is human relationships with other species that are key to understanding real world religion” (Harvey, 2). I tend to agree with these perspectives, which just makes understanding my relationship to food all the more relevant.

Within the United States—where I live—perhaps the biggest issue with food is where it’s coming from. Farming labor practices from many of the places out-of-country where produce and product are imported from are often terrible, typically used in conjunction with paying people as little as possible and ignoring more local, but operationally expensive, options to maximize profit. Shipping out-of-season fruits and vegetables also is exorbitant in terms of carbon emissions as well.

With meat, you run into similar issues. Large grocery stores and chains will often purchase meat from companies which have questionable ethics, and which prioritize money above all else, making for unfortunately vague situations. It is often difficult, if not outright impossible, to know both how an animal was treated and raised before it died, and how it was killed when one is shopping for meat at a Wal-Mart or Publix. The exception to the rule is Halal and Kosher meats, but that focuses significantly more on the practices of ethical slaughter than the animal’s livelihood—something still important, but perhaps not as whole of a picture as an individual may desire.

There’s also the problem of large-scale animal production on a more general front, outside of animal welfare-oriented concerns: it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to say that collapsing large swathes of land into cookie cutter pastures to raise huge amounts of animals that aren’t native to an environment is going to have wide-reaching effects on all levels.

So how does someone like me engage in this verifiable minefield when it comes to purchasing the food that I need to eat?

In a perfect, picturesque world, I’m sure someone would suggest that I simply stop eating “bad” things and start to make sure I eat “good” things. Usually this takes the form of militant/radical vegan commentary on how you can only be ethical if you’re sucking off an asparagus at any given time, but these types of options are things I’ve already tried in the past.

I’ve tried going into no-meat diets to at least stem the flow on one front and focus solely on vegetable and fruit problems, but it just wasn’t realistic for me as a person. I have a nut allergy that makes most substitutes untenable and the texture problems I have related to my ADHD make the rest almost entirely unpalatable. Unless it’s fried, tofu is gross…and frankly, even then it’s not my favorite thing. There’s also a medical issue where I can’t eat most forms of pasta and tomato products, which are major staples in many meat-free diets. My mental state started to swing towards more feral and animalistic behaviors and feelings in the months I tried this no-meat diet, which culminated in some sort of black-out food-related berserk shift when I “woke up” and found half of a multiple-meat omelet in my hands, with the rest in my mouth. Needless to say, I didn’t try a vegetarian or vegan diet again after that.

As of right now I don’t have a strict “I can eat x amount of y” type diet, though I do consider my food consumption as falling into the flexible “low-meat” category: my polycule tends to have meat with most dinners, but lunches and breakfasts are much more of a coin flip depending on leftovers and what we have in the fridge, with us often defaulting to smaller, more simple meals like salads, rice, and egg-based meals. This is largely because of our lifestyle, which doesn’t lend itself to multiple “big” prep-heavy or time-heavy meals a day, and of our budget and how we go about getting our food.

We’re very luckily in that there are small farms, butchers, and fishing companies local to our area which stage up at the weekly farmer’s market, an opportunity that not many people have. Purchasing produce locally is significantly less expensive than buying it at Wal-Mart or Publix, with the added benefit of a longer shelf life and the functionally insignificant downside of a smaller selection based on what’s in-season. The money we save on produce gets flipped into the money we spend on fish at the market, where we’ll grab whatever’s in-season and looking good from a sustainable fishing-focused company. The fresh caught fish is more expensive than what you’d find elsewhere due to the company’s practices, but it’s significantly more flavorful and we know how and where it’s being caught.

We also have more food-related plans for the future: as silly as it might initially sound, owning chickens is an option we have seriously looked into, should we ever have the space to do so. Producing our own eggs with animals we know are being well cared for is something both myself and my polycule would love to do, especially given how much our household relies on eggs as a staple. It’d also give me the option of butchering my own meat or bringing my meat to a butcher of my choice, something which I’ve wanted to get involved with for a long time.

Maybe it’s because I’ve done so much introspection as a carnivore, but it feels strange and almost unethical to not take part in the actual act of killing and preparing an animal for food. If I’m eating creatures that were previously alive and had emotions of their own, it feels disingenuous and dishonorable to not take part in the process of butchering itself at least once so that I can more fully understand and appreciate the work that goes into turning, say, a chicken into chicken. In Western society it’s so common for us to just not know (to even prefer not to know) how it’s best to kill and prep certain animals and I think that’s a major part of the problem with how people both tend to overconsume certain varieties of meat and how people tend to overcorrect into anti-meat attitudes that support harmful or downright dangerous industries, all the while both types of individuals refuse to engage with the potential problems or ramifications of doing so. Eating meat isn’t a one-way street or black-and-white in how it functions, and I hate that it’s so often treated as such: it’s not something that you should just ignore the facts around because it makes you uncomfortable. You should know where your meat comes from in a more intimate fashion, confronting that discomfort and fear head on because it is genuinely your responsibility to do so if you’re going to partake in either eating meat or judging those who do as unconscionable.

This all is a part of the reason I’m also interested in hunting and fishing. Florida is so full of invasive species that there’s a major environmental benefit to be had from going out and spearing lionfish or shooting boars, and it would also let me engage in the acts myself, rather than just shoving the job onto someone else while I get to reap the delicious rewards. And it guarantees that all parts of the animal that can be used will be, and that nothing will go to waste—bones, hides, organs, everything. Were it not for the fact that I lived in a capital hellscape that required me to spend a majority of my time and energy making money for other people, this would truly be the ideal option, and it’s one I’m hoping to more seriously engage with it post-Covid in a few years.

This knowledge and recognition of the cycle of life at play in regards to my own food source has massively influenced my larger perspectives on both animals and death. Learning about death in all its forms makes it so much less mysterious and terrifying. It’s an inevitable end for all forms of life and that is a unifying fact in it of itself: it’s something natural, something that we shouldn’t shy away from or ignore over the course of our lives. It should function as a reminder to be kind to ourselves, tolerant of each other, caring to the animals we are caretakers for, and supportive of the larger ecosystems that sustain us and will be needed to sustain future generations. I think that if we can improve larger Western societal understandings and intimate interactions with where our food comes from, especially in regards to other animals, it might help to salvage some of the cluttered and terrified relationships we have at large with death and could also foster more of a sense of responsibility on a larger scale as we become intimate with death more face-to-face. Ignoring death is not understanding death, and all ignoring it does is prevent us from seeing the necessity of it and, when applicable, the tragedy of it. This can be applied on multiple levels, but I personally believe it starts first and foremost with our relationship with food.

#inkedpaws #alterhuman #otherkin #therian

73 notes · View notes

linastudyblrsblog · 4 years

Text

Burnout, unfortunately, is everywhere. If you haven’t experienced it personally, you probably know someone who has self-diagnosed.

Defined by the World Health Organization as a syndrome “conceptualized as resulted from chronic workplace stress,” it causes exhaustion, “feelings of negativism or cynicism,” and reduced efficacy. That’s a big umbrella, and the condition has become something of a catch-all for chronic, modern-day stress.

Here are 11 of our favorites to help you create your own escape plan:

1. Figure out which kind of burnout you have.

The Association for Psychological Science found that burnout comes in three different types, and each one needs a different solution:

1. Overload: The frenetic employee who works toward success until exhaustion, is most closely related to emotional venting. These individuals might try to cope with their stress by complaining about the organizational hierarchy at work, feeling as though it imposes limits on their goals and ambitions. That coping strategy, unsurprisingly, seems to lead to a stress overload and a tendency to throw in the towel.

2. Lack of Development: Most closely associated with an avoidance coping strategy. These under-challenged workers tend to manage stress by distancing themselves from work, a strategy that leads to depersonalization and cynicism — a harbinger for burning out and packing up shop.

3. Neglect: Seems to stem from a coping strategy based on giving up in the face of stress. Even though these individuals want to achieve a certain goal, they lack the motivation to plow through barriers to get to it

2. Cut down and start saying “no.”

Every “yes” you say adds another thing on your plate and takes more energy away from you, and your creativity:

If you take on too many commitments, start saying ‘no’. If you have too many ideas, execute a few and put the rest in a folder labeled ‘backburner’. If you suffer from information overload, start blocking off downtime or focused worktime in your schedule (here are some tools that may help). Answer email at set times. Switch your phone off, or even leave it behind. The world won’t end. I promise.

3. Give up on getting motivated.

With real burnout mode, you’re too exhausted to stay positive. So don’t:

When you’re mired in negative emotions about work, resist the urge to try to stamp them out. Instead, get a little distance — step away from your desk, focus on your breath for a few seconds — and then just feel the negativity, without trying to banish it. Then take action alongside the emotion. Usually, the negative feelings will soon dissipate. Even if they don’t, you’ll be a step closer to a meaningful achievement.

4. Treat the disease, not the symptoms.

For real recovery and prevention to happen, you need to find the real, deeper issue behind why you’re burnt out:

Instead of overreacting to the blip, step back from it, see it as an incident instead of an indictment, and then examine it like Sherlock Holmes looking for clues.

For example, you could ask yourself: What happened before the slip? Did I encounter a specific trigger event such as a last-minute client request? Was there an unusual circumstance such as sickness? When did I first notice the reversion in my behavior? Is some part of this routine unsustainable and if so, how could I adjust it to make it more realistic?

5. Make downtime a daily ritual.

To help relieve pressure, schedule daily blocks of downtime to refuel your brain and well-being. It can be anything from meditation to a nap, a walk, or simply turning off the wifi for a while:

When it comes to scheduling, we will need to allocate blocks of time for deep thinking. Maybe you will carve out a 1-2 hour block on your calendar every day for taking a walk or grabbing a cup of coffee and just pondering some of those bigger things. I can even imagine a day when homes and apartments have a special switch that shuts down wi-fi and data access during dinner or at night – just to provide a temporary pause from the constant flow of status updates and other communications…

There is no better mental escape from our tech-charged world than the act of meditation. If only for 15 minutes, the ability to steer your mind away from constant stimulation is downright liberating. There are various kinds of meditation. Some forms require you to think about nothing and completely clear your mind. (This is quite hard, at least for me.) Other forms of meditation are about focusing on one specific thing – often your breath, or a mantra that you repeat in your head (or out loud) for 10-15 minutes…

If you can’t adopt meditation, you might also try clearing your mind the old fashioned way – by sleeping. The legendary energy expert and bestselling author Tony Schwartz takes a 20-minute nap every day. Even if it’s a few hours before he presents to a packed audience, he’ll take a short nap.

6. Stop being a perfectionist; start satisficing.

Trying to maximize every task and squeeze every drop of productivity out of your creative work is a recipe for exhaustion and procrastination. Set yourself boundaries for acceptable work and stick to them:

Consistently sacrificing your health, your well being, your relationships, and your sanity for the sake of living up to impossible standards will lead to some dangerous behaviors and, ironically, a great deal of procrastination. Instead of saying, “I’ll stay up until this is done,” say, “I’ll work until X time and then I’m stopping. I may end up needing to ask for an extension or complete less than perfect work. But that’s OK. I’m worth it.” Making sleep, exercise, and downtime a regular part of your life plays an essential role in a lasting, productive creative career.

7. Track your progress every day.

Keeping track allows you to see exactly how much is on your plate, not only day-to-day, but consistently over time:

Disappointing feedback can be painful at first – research shows that failure and losses can hurt twice as much as the pleasure of equivalent gains. But if you discover you’re off course, reliable feedback shows you by how much, and you then have the opportunity to take remedial action and to plot a new training regime or writing schedule. The temporary pain of negative feedback is nothing compared with the crushing experience of project failure. Better to discover that you’re behind and need to start writing an hour earlier each day, than to have your book contract rescinded further down the line because you’ve failed to deliver.

8. Change location often.

Entrepreneurs or freelancers can be especially prone to burnout. Joel Runyon plays “workstation popcorn,” in which he groups tasks by location and then switches, in order to keep work manageable, provide himself frequent breaks, and spend his time efficiently:

You find yourself spending hours at your computer, dutifully “working” but getting very little done. You finish each day with the dreaded feeling that you’re behind, and that you’re only falling farther and farther behind. You’re buried below an ever-growing to-do list. There’s a feeling of dread that tomorrow is coming, and that it’s bringing with it even more work that you probably won’t be able to get ahead on.

List out everything you need to do today. Try to be as specific as you can…Next, break that list into three sections. Step 1: Go to cafe [or desk, a different table in your office, etc.] #1. Step 2: Start working on item group #1…Once you finish all the tasks in group #1, get up and move. Close your tabs, pack your bags, and physically move your butt to your next spot. If you can, walk or bike to your next stop…When you get to the next cafe [or spot], start on the next action item group, and repeat…

When you’ve completed everything on your to-do list for the day, you are done working. Relax, kick back, and live your life. Don’t take work home with you because that won’t help you get more done – it will just wear you out.

9. Don’t overload what downtime you do get.

Vacations themselves can cause, or worsen burnout, with high-stress situations, expectations, and sleep interruption. Use it to help in recovery from burnout instead:

Make a flexible itinerary a priority. [A] study from Radboud University found that effective vacations give you the choice and freedom to choose what you want to do. That means two things: Try to avoid structuring your vacation around an unbreakable schedule, and plan on going somewhere that has multiple options to pick from depending on the weather, your level of energy, or your budget.

10. Write yourself fan mail.

Seth Godin uses self-fan mail as a way to keep motivated instead of burning out on a project that seems far from completion:

I define non-clinical anxiety as, “experiencing failure in advance.” If you’re busy enacting a future that hasn’t happened yet, and amplifying the worst possible outcomes, it’s no wonder it’s difficult to ship that work. With disappointment, I note that our culture doesn’t have an easily found word for the opposite. For experiencing success in advance. For visualizing the best possible outcomes before they happen. Will your book get a great testimonial? Write it out. Will your talk move someone in the audience to change and to let you know about it? What did they say? Will this new product gain shelf space at the local market? Take a picture. Writing yourself fan mail in advance, and picturing the change you’ve announced you’re trying, to make is an effective way to push yourself to build something that actually generates that action.

11. Break projects into bite-sized pieces.

Taking a task on in one entire lump can be exhausting and provide little room for rest in between. Breaking up your projects into set chunks with their own deadlines provides a much healthier, and easier, way of completing a large project:

The default take on deadlines is typically to consider them to be cumbersome and stressful. Yet, from another perspective, a deadline can be viewed as a huge benefit to any project. Without the urgency of a hard deadline pushing a project to completion, it’s easy for you, your team, or your client to lose focus. We’ve all worked on agonizing projects where the timeline just bleeds on and on, merely because the flexibility is there…

It turns out that the manner in which a task is presented to someone – or the way in which you present it to your brain – has a significant impact on how motivated you will be to take action. A study led by researcher Sean McCrea at the University of Konstanz in Germany recently found that people are much more likely to tackle a concrete task than an abstract task… It seems to me like the difference between being handed a map versus following the step-by-step instructions of a GPS device. Not everyone can read a map, but everyone can follow the directions. By breaking your project down into smaller, well-described tasks, the way forward becomes clear and it’s easy to take action.

63 notes · View notes

architectuul · 3 years

Text

Radical Rituals

forty-five degrees is an open collective of architects and designers dedicated to the research and critical making of collective space. They take different forms when engaging in collaborations with other experts, adapting to the project’s scope. In their practice, space-making is about resources, not only material or financial but the intangible resources of human and non-human knowledge.

Talking in the park in front of Tageszeitung in Berlin-Mitte with Alkistis Thomidou and Berta Gutierrez. | Photo © Boštjan Bugarič

Their work aims at investigating the built environment through research, design and artistic experimentation, across multiple scales and in its social, economical and structural entanglements.They are collecting protocols and collective approaches, exploring alternative living and city making models and new paradigms of urban development to engage with communities and local agents. They strive to create inclusive and accessible spaces through careful use of scale, material and design language with a commitment to rethinking education through academia and practice placing design at the intersection of arts and sciences. Berta Gutierrez and Alkistis Thomidou were talking to Boštjan Bugarič.

***

For this interview we meet in a new park next to Hejduk’s Tower; why did we meet here? BG: I really appreciate Hejduk's theoretical work and I find it very relevant nowadays since I believe it can give us many leads on how architecture should be taught during the contemporary crisis.

In 2010 the architecture community gathered to protect the Kreuzberg Tower as new owners began altering the facade. | Photo © Boštjan Bugarič

Around this park are also other important buildings? AT: On the other side we find a first cooperatively built project for offices, FRIZZ, and on the other there is also the new TAZ building.

This park is divided with paths (lines), how can we create these lines? AT: This area had a very strange atmosphere although it is quite central. I am actually the first time in the park after its renovation. These lines cutting through the space shall be a result of shortcuts where people cross the former park, literally, the footprint.

“Radical Rituals” is an itinerary survey along the 45ºN parallel, on the inventiveness of everyday life, new hybrid vernacular practices and rituals that stimulate and nurture the commons across Europe. | Photo © forty-five degrees

What about your line, the forty-five degree? What is a project about? AT: The name came along with the idea of a research of the 45ºN parallel as many people in our team come from the south of Europe but studied or work and live in the north part of Europe. This line has influenced our way of thinking and although it is a fictional line it burdens Europe and represents a border that people try to cross every day from South to North. We wanted to investigate what is happening along this line that crosses France, Italy, Croatia, Serbia, Romania all the way to the Black Sea. Although it cuts the middle of Europe, cities around it are considered ‘peripheral’. We are researching how the European identity is reflected along this line.

Polarisation between north and south, heterogeneous economic models, diversity of cultural and historic backgrounds. | Photo EW Elsevier Weekblad, Issue 22, 2020

What have you discovered so far? BG: We are currently preparing our first field trip, and we will be in Romania and Serbia by September. Right now this is a very fascinating part of the project as it is like a zoom into the ground. If you go very far away, you see the meridians and parallels as the way of shaping the world, but when you start to get closer, you see countries, borders, cities, landscapes and people. We would like to zoom in as much as possible, so we can really understand local situated practices that are happening in very specific physical environments.

AT: The project “Radical Rituals” is a survey on very local spatial practices or initiatives that addresses climate challenges, space justice and biodiversity. We want to be surprised by what we learn along the way, what kind of collectivity is created and how local identities can influence space production.

A British writer Shumon Basar references the metallic flowers of Hejduk on the facade as,"grips for angels to hold onto when they climb the sides of the tower” inspired by “Wings of Desire"by Wim Wenders. | Photo © Boštjan Bugarič

BG: In this sense it is great that we are in front of Hejduk’s building because he proposes the way in which design comes as a result of small narratives or characters entangled with each other, working with crafts or local materials and contexts. For us the exercise is similar, but instead of working with fiction we work with reality as nowadays reality is complex enough. We don’t have all the answers to these challenging topics, but we believe that this exercise will give us a sort of light.

AT: Through this research we want to see what stories point to possible futures and possible present-s as people develop tools and knowledge that is embedded in the context of the local space. We worked on this concept at the Architecture Triennial in Oslo, where we created a digital Atlas that connects OAT’s archive and discourse with the transformations that take place on the city’s ground through local initiatives. We encountered initiatives that manage to achieve systemic changes and give multiple answers to the big challenges we are facing. In a way, proving that the environment is a primal source of our knowledge.

Oslo In Action(s) is a research project uncovering city-makers who stimulate and nurture the commons beyond the boundaries of professional practice.

The Digital Atlas was commissioned by the Oslo Architecture Triennial for their 20th jubilee “Conversations about the city". | Photo © forty-five degrees

Your practice was as well put on the list of the Future Architecture Platform? How do you see yourself in the FAP? AT: It was an important experience to have this opportunity of working with people and institutions. We met extremely generous and inspiring people in Ljubljana and then in Oslo. Then, we got the digital research fellowship at Architectuul which enables us to meet and connect with other projects and not just sit in our office and work on the research but expand our network and bring different perspectives together. We are very grateful that the Future Architecture Platform gave space for this project.

Initiatives in Oslo (up) and Urtegata Sykkellevert space for multimedia production and Tøyen Taxi. | Photo © forty-five degrees

Just finished curating a panel on Kvadrato, how did you choose panels and why you wanted to present them? AT: The panel was called ‘Communication for Commonalities’, where we invited diverse initiatives that work collectively and with several communities. Their work spans from creating digital platforms that communicate collective intelligence on a global scale, to very local projects that engage directly with a variety of actors on the ground.

With Akerselva Trebåtforening, we paddled on a 100-year-old wooden boat on an underground river running into the fjord (up); Losæter is the city farm of Oslo. | Photo © forty-five degrees

BG: It was a great example for us to address our questions and concerns and discuss them in the context of communication of architecture. As we know, communication in architecture is about media and its symbolic representation. Nevertheless, for us communication is related with the ground, physical context, methodologies and the communication channels that people use to promulgate the project with peers or bigger networks.

The Fjord floating saunas - Oslo Badstuforening. | Photo © forty-five degrees

The legendary GSF Skatepark. | Photo © forty-five degrees

The Oslo fjordhage, a floating classroom dome. | Photo © forty-five degrees

How you integrate the theoretical methods in the learning process? BG: In my personal research I try to answer the question of how do we promote other ways of learning coming from non-disciplinary practices since academia became such a rigid space with a very outdated curriculum. With non-disciplinary practices beyond academia we can really find many inputs on this crossing.

Berta Gutierrez and Alkistis Thomidou | Photo © Boštjan Bugarič

AT: We are currently collaborating with two other international practices on an Erasmus+ Youth in Action project on how to learn together. During the next two years we will develop formats of different ways of learning and engaging youth to physical interaction with various spaces in the city, public, private or common areas. We see the engagement of young adults in space-making processes as a project of emancipation and investment in the future.

#digital fellow #future architecture

2 notes · View notes

vyuktha · 3 years

Text

DESIGN FICTION

The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” - Alan Kay

Future does not exists, but as a result of the ideas, discoveries and decisions that the world is making a large number possibilities of the future can be created.

The way design has shaped the world in approaching to any difficulty or issue is commendable. The process of design thinking has changed radically over time. Earlier design was often restricted to certain finite fields and crafts out in the world. But with time, efforts have been made to change the approach towards design and design thinking process. And it no longer is defined as a fixed notion. Design is all about creating non existing ideas to make the experience of living uncomplicated. This implies to the fact that the design future will be the consequence of the solutions created for today’s problems.

Designing for future can be challenging. But with the emerging systematic changes, critical thinking and methodologies the process of designing for the future has become less complicated. Though achievable by following a certain strategy, this is only effective for the very near future. So the existence of a particular future is still questionable. How to determine what qualifies as a functioning future? What potential do the present designs hold in shaping the future? This is where design fiction comes into play.

WHAT IS DESIGN FICTION?

The term was first cited in Bruce Sterling’s book Shaping Things. He defines it as

"Design Fiction is the deliberate use of diegetic prototypes to suspend disbelief

about change".

Design fiction can be understood as a process of creating fictional world to

understand the impact of emerging technology and design ideologies with the

utilization of narrative to determine how well they fit in. Design fiction creates a

story-world with prototypes within the story-world. It provides a method to

empathise, understand, define, ideate and critique the possibilities of future

interactions by creating fictional worlds within which the prototypes and user

can coexist.

Along with improving the current user flow design fiction also engages in

improving the user experience. It provides a comfortable flow to the user that

the user is completely unaware of. It resonates with the users because of its

“fictional world” theory, which helps the users to understand it through their

experience of exploring the fictional world which might not be easier to do in

the present reality. The designers are able to look into the potential futures and

their aim is to formulate important and difficult questions about the world. To

explore these fictional worlds future focused artefacts are used.

The term “diegetic prototype” inked by David Kirby in his essay “The Future Is

Now: Diegetic Prototypes and the Role of Popular Films in Generating Real-

world Technological Development” demonstrates the future technologies

through cinematic representations. These diegetic prototypes are created

through dialogue, plot rationalizations, character interactions and narrative

structure. Diegetic prototype provides a functional value in a fictional world.

DESIGN FICTION IN THE WORLD OF INTERACTION DESIGN

Design fiction can be seen as an emerging field within interaction design. It is very evident that there are numerous interpretations and ideologies of design fiction. Blythe and Wright define design fiction as a “much needed complementary method in user centred design that give designers access to inner felt aspects of user experience”. Design fiction practises the research method of prototyping the future and how the potential worlds exist as design fiction. Recent studies in HCI and Interaction design prove that various practices are being identified. Methods like as scenarios and personas are being used.

[A persona can be defined as character that is used to represent a user of your

website, service, product, or brand. It helps in targeting their designs around

the user’s requirements.

A scenario is a situation that captures how users perform tasks on your site or

app. A scenario describes the user’s question that needs to be answered, and

suggest possible ways to accomplish these tasks. ]

Design fiction as a method is being practised in the field of interaction design to explore the potential technologies. Various ideologies can be established

and exchanged amongst the designers. These ideas will help in achieving in a clear picture and can be put to use for specific purposes within various design projects. As mentioned earlier

, fictional worlds are explored through future

focused artefacts. The artefacts can be in the form of books, Research Papers,

journals, films, models etc. These can establish a discursive space between the

designer and the audience by making functional, aesthetic, pragmatic, political

statements and discussing imaginary technologies.

The field of Human Computer Interaction is oriented to the future through both

discursive and experiential methods. It focuses on methods of visualization via

the characteristics of fiction to illustrate technological opportunities. These

discursive approaches often surface critical questions about the technology.

The techniques of experiential prototyping have expanded the opportunities to

understand the aspects of non-existing technological innovations which could

exist. It provides opportunities to bridge the speculative and experiential

approaches to design i.e. the ability to imagine the future and the ability to

experience it. It helps in understanding the pattern of actions while the user is

engaging with machines.

Again let us consider

Various

methods of user experience design are documented in the medium of virtual

reality. Design fiction extends methods of VR prototyping by providing an

interaction within the virtual narratives. This focuses on two important aspects

of the characters’ (basically the user) participation; presence and impact i.e.

whether the character is present in the world or not, whether you are the

character with an impact or not. With this approach, tangible design fiction

elements can be explored in depth by engaging with possible future scenarios

within a story-world in VR. VR works have also demonstrated the ways that

these participative experiences can help the users take on the perspective of

the unfamiliar

VR as a diegetic feature of the story-world.

subjects and empathize with them.

Hence design fiction is an approach that bridges experiential and speculative approaches to design. It provides a take on how immersive technologies might impact the future. It gives the designer the opportunity to expand their ideas and develop new prototypes for the future.

REFERENCES:

1. McVeigh-Schultz, Joshua & Kreminski, Max & Prasad, Keshav & Hoberman, Perry & Fisher, Scott. (2018). Immersive Design Fiction: Using VR to Prototype Speculative Interfaces and Interaction Rituals within a Virtual Storyworld

2. Mark Blythe (Northumbria University, 2014). Research Through Design Fiction: Narrative in Real and Imaginary Abstracts

3. Davis Levine (https://medium.com/@davislevine). Design Fiction

1 note · View note

fmdtaeyongarchive · 4 years

Text

↬ drippin’.

date: november 2019.

location: n/a.

word count: 522 words

summary: ash participating in the creation of “drip” for (unknown to him at the time) the colla3orate project.

notes: this is solely for my reference because it’s not mentioned, but these are the lyrics ash wrote (translated). won’t be specific about composition/production because i’m lazy.:

“The rain is spreading in the white moonlight / Inside the dream that is slowly drenching us”

“I want the you that is hidden deep inside your heart / [...] / Rather than acting kind, I want your honest gaze / [...] / Give me everything you have”

“The world you knew is falling apart / Let me in a bit deeper / We’re inside a dream only you know”

“You’ll be even more enchanted / [...] / Drop by drop it will wake up your heart / Drippin’ drippin’ drippin’”

“Cold but sweet kissing / You won’t be able to forget this feeling”

ash is surprised when one of the producers he knows invites him to participate in a song camp. though he desires to be taken seriously as a songwriter and producer, his unique situation of being an idol who primarily writes for himself and other idols means he doesn’t have much experience in the ritual of song camps that companies love to throw producers into to create their next hit song. he’s done something similar for some of the songs on his latest album in getting together with several other writers and throwing ideas around, but it’s different writing songs for himself than a vague other.

a new concept is brought to the table after they’ve cranked out rough drafts of a few other songs. they build off of a short beat and melody snippet one of the other producers had brought to the meeting with the aim of a classic ‘girl crush’ track. they aren’t writing for any one group or even company in particular, but the idea of ‘girl crush’ in the modern industry brings to mind groups like 7rophy and femme fatale with songs like black dress and ddu-du ddu-du, but the roots of his exposure to the idol industry and their many boxes of concepts brings to mind silhouette with i don’t need a man and gal.actic with their sexier brand of girl crush in the mid-2010s. perhaps his inexperience in the setting is showing, but ash’s contributions only come once he envisions the song in the hands of a group he’s already familiar with.

more of his input makes it into the melody and the production than he expects considering the number of other producers in the room. it isn’t a bulk of the song, to be sure, but it turns out he isn’t as completely useless as he’d anticipated himself being until he was more used to the format they’re creating in. some of his ideas are shot down for being too old-fashioned for the song they’re going for, leaning too heavily into the songs he remembers watching his seniors perform on music shows around his debut instead of the ones his juniors are releasing these days, but it’s far from the worst rejection he’s gotten in his songwriting career.

the others take the lead on the lyrics, nailing down the hook and expanding on the concept to the members of the imaginary girl group in their minds taking on a classic seductive ice queen role. it’s not a point of view ash is used to writing from, so he listens, scribbling half-formed ideas down on a notepad, unable to finish his thoughts and present them for the longest time until he gets the courage to throw out some suggestions for the chorus. a couple of his suggestions stick, and he finds his way back inside the circle again instead of looking in from the outside.

when they finish, they move onto another song and ash forgets about drip by the time he leaves the studio building into the darkness of the seoul night, mind more occupied by mentally running through his schedule for the following day.

#me: has actual verifications to do #me: let's write about ash writing something i don't have to verify instead :)#&& bring color to my skies | character development #&& queued

5 notes · View notes

all-things-are-nothing-to-me · 4 years

Text

Smashing the Petri Dish: Abbreviated Inquiry Into Abandoning the Concept of Culture

The following are questions I have recently asked myself:

Why abandon culture? There are countless reasons to begin to challenge, seriously realign our relationship with, and perhaps abandon the concept of culture — the historic, contemporary, and projected assemblage of social dynamics and features by which we define ourselves and which collectively frame us as social groupings. Culture contains the all-tofamiliar civilized notions of expectations, projections, customs, taboos, values, morality, and rituals, as well as being anthropocentric in nature, and in general, limited as it defines the human condition of a place, time, and context only in terms of human relationships or how we use other things. The human-animal, unrestrained by such an understanding of reality, and in tune with applicable concerns of connected subsistence and curious play, needs not for culture as something to belong to or to be guided by. Instead, they are what they are, a composition of all they are connected to, yet unique unto themselves. And if relationships are fluid, unbounded by artificial concepts, and based on mutual desire, than what use or need is there for culture, except to define and confine these relationships. It might be proposed then, that our search for liberation may fall outside the parameters of the concept of culture, and in fact, may be in contradiction with its very existence. Culture, whether ethnic, religious, national, tribal, pop, alternative, or counter, acts as a definer rather than minimalizer of the borders within and between ourselves, each other, and the rest of life.

Can we challenge the current basis of our relationships to each other? For many, to abandon culture seems a project too daunting, shocking, and counter to what we may have always believed. But when we talk of undoing the entirety of civilization, are there questions too colossal to ask and material too compact to cut through? To dispute culture itself, and the physicality of its politicized manifestation, society, is to question civilization’s very premise, that we are controlled and manipulated by external forces that have an agenda ultimately incompatible with that of the individual, regardless of their desires (although there may be illusory moments of adaptability). Whether there are direct lines drawn to individuals or groups in power, or the rigid formation of patterns and textures over time, culture controls. It must, or it ceases to exist. Culture can be viewed as the summation of who we are as social beings, or the parameters we live within. Both are unsatisfactory for one attempting an uncivilized and unrestrained existence. If we are to live entirely different, than what seems foundational and what binds all of this (civilization) must be unglued. The imprint must be erased. The structures must be shattered, so as to open up the space for our unimpeded wild selves to roam.

Is there an intrinsic element of cultivation that leads to the formation of rigid socialization? The cultivation of crops and tillage of the earth created a different context in which we dwell then that of the human-animal in a pre-civilized context. With the domination of the land, stratification of society, accumulation of power, creation of economy, and religious mystification of the world, culture takes root as an all-encompassing means of control. To put it simply, when there are things to keep in order, an orderly society is preferable. With this comes the standardization of society, the suggestion of values, the implementation of codes, and the enforcement of regulations, be they physical, intellectual, or spiritual. Overt force is always adjacent (at least the allegation of it), but to convince people they are a part of an abstract grouping, and that it is superior to any other, cultural identity is a much more effective means of control. And, to convince them of their need to view contrary or deviant inclinations of the belief system as an Other, also sets the ground for the defending of culture. The abstraction of unmediated relationships might be where we start to see concepts of culture as necessary. Before (or outside this perspective) what purpose would it serve?

What about the process of domestication is inevitable in culture? Development of humans as individuals and societies in general through education, discipline, and training, seems to require obedience to societal norms, recognized largely as cultural. The goal, as with any other form of domestication, is to obtain a uniform and productive crop or yield in as efficient means as possible. Individuality and fluidity are seen as hazards to be reigned in or plowed under. Possibly, depending on how bumper a crop that season, or how much power the domesticator has accumulated, some unruly weeds are allowed to exist on the periphery, but even they are still largely controlled, if only due to the proximity to the disciplined ones.

Are socialization and control implicit in the perpetuation and acceptance of culture? Culture attempts to express and prescribe meaning to our world. This meaning is typically, and I would argue inevitably, used to obtain and maintain power and control. Culture regularly has both a conservative and progressive character to it. Both securing society and pushing it forward stability and innovation. Traditional cultural values which sustain the contemporary aims of a society’s influence and momentum are often supported while the proposed future for that society is often portrayed as intrinsic trajectories for that culture. The tension between them keeps things moving. At any particular stage of advancement in a civilization, the characteristic features of such a stage are described as its culture. So that what is described as permanent, is never so, and that which is promoted as temporary is often an illusion of change. The bottom line is, the path of a society, and the cultural aspects of it, are quite arbitrary, yet presented as predetermined. To not be acquiescent in this set-up places one, for all practical purposes, outside of cultural reality. But the rejection of culture is certainly not a rejection of social interaction. The isolated human, rarely a healthy, connected, and successfully functioning being (by any standards), is typically the product of extreme alienation and trauma. Anti-social behavior, as a specific description, is relative to the context of the society, but it describes more of a disconnect from the ability to interact then a rejection of that society’s values. One can be positively a social being (and possibly they must be) and still attempt to dismantle that society and its social characteristics, especially if their processes of social interaction are from outside that society. As interaction and relations removed from the alienated and mediated civilized methods tend to be more direct, fluid, and intuitive, without the clunky dominating, and often insincere methods we are instilled with, it seems key to any sort of positive alternative.

Ever notice the “cult” in culture? Socially, there is great pressure, from authoritarianism to tension between “civilians”, to create a mindless following that is pervasive throughout society. There develops an affiliation of accomplices who adopt complete and societal belief systems or faiths. Those who move too close to the margins are regarded and handled as outsiders, which strictly maintains the definitions applied to a culture. In addition, the progressive linearity of cultural enlightenment and refinement through intellectual and aesthetic training occurs at all levels, from fashion to philosophy. Details and motivations of our actions that are obtained, recorded, and remembered through vastly different perceptions and bias perspectives, acquired through a cultural context and individual views, are filtered, averaged, and distilled to create a prevalent, repeated response system.

But what about primitive people and useful traditions? There is probably more from the past that we have carelessly discarded than we have critically shed, especially concerning earth-based peoples from gatherer hunters to horticulturists to pre-technological agriculturists and homesteaders (in my opinion, there is less to appreciate as we move onward in domestication, but from where we are located in history, there is still some value in critically assessing small-scale cultivators for some useful aspects). Examining the dynamics and methods of these various types of groupings for everything from food procurement to social organization (not that they aren’t inevitably linked) will reveal a great diversity between peoples and the strategies and patterns that have developed, and typically, unfortunately, formed into a culture. This investigation can also reveal common threads in how situations, needs, and problems are dealt with, which we can filter through our own unique and communal desires and contexts to apply to our lives, without adopting cultural parameters and definitions. Techniques are valuable, cultural explanations are useless, unless they reveal a relationship between things that can be utilized without socializing.

Life contains some underlying stability of circumstance, yet within it is an infinite and intricate shifting, fracturing, and supporting over time. A never-ending improvisation of reinforcing and interfering, but never repeating. Even the seemingly firmly structured parts are composed of limitless variables. We might be inspired by the way the Kaluli tribe of the Papuan Plateau perceive and interact with the world. For instance, they do not hear singular sounds in the rainforest, but instead an interlocking soundscape they call dulugu ganalan, or “lifting- up-over sounding”; millions of simultaneous sound cycles, starting and ending at different points. People’s voices layer and play off of this reality, as drums, axes, and singing blend together in rhythms and patterns creating an instinctual vocabulary understood by the group.

So what might living outside of culture look like? To start with, it would be free from moral and social frameworks that limit our freedom to explore, experience, and connect. We would still be “bound” by certain biological and geographical limitations, but not those determined by any experts or leaders. Instead we would experience directly these limitations, and along with shared experiences with others, develop our own unique understandings. Collective experience would not fit into any prearranged formation or contain any unified meaning. It would be the infinite intersections of support and divergence that make up the rest of what we call life. Rather than thinking in cultural terms, perhaps we can look at other social animals for inspiration. Flocks, herds, and packs can be contemplated for their manifestations and dynamics of living patterns. Instinctual rather than intellectual in motivation and stable yet flexible in an organic manner, rather than enforced or altered through mechanistic and projected means. Is this not closer to how humans live(d) outside of civilization?

Can we smash the petri dish and abandon the stifling concept of culture for an unobstructed reality? If we are content with the role of microorganisms in a prepared nutrient media or the product of such cultivation, then life as part of a culture is acceptable, even desirable and beneficial. If we are not satisfied as bacteria, segments of tissues, or fungi in a scientist’s test tube or observation dish, then we need to begin to seriously review how we relate to, coordinate, and view ourselves, each other, and the world around us. We can trade the abstraction, symbolic, efficiency, control, and completeness of superimposed culture for the connected, direct, dynamic, openness of unalienated existence.

The choice really is ours.

#A. Morefus #anti civ #communism #anarchism #green anarchy

24 notes · View notes

tanadrin · 4 years

Text

Reordberend

(part 21 of ?; first; previous; next)

(BTW, as of this update, Reordberend is, by my count, a little over 45k words long, putting it in the territory of a shortish novel. That also makes it one of the longest SF stories I’ve ever written. It’s not the most popular thing I’ve ever posted on Tumblr, but it has gotten a steady trickle of notes. Knowing there are people out there who enjoy your work, even if it’s fairly niche, is the best motivation there is to keep writing. Thank you for reading!)

Katherine Alice Green The Guest Room in the Village Hall The High Settlement McMurdo Dry Valleys ANTARCTICA

to Dr. Eunice Valerie Gordon Trinity College Dublin Dublin 2 IRELAND

Dear Dr. Gordon,

I am writing yet another letter I won’t be able to send, which, I realize might make me seem like kind of a crazy person. The only defense I can plead, I guess, is that the perpetual darkness of the winters here does funny things to you if you’re not used to it, and I’ve had a lot of down time lately that I need to do something productive with. I have already written to my parents, to a couple of friends, and to my cat, which leaves only you. And these letters seem to have a way of focusing my thoughts, so maybe it’s not an entirely useless exercise.

Where to begin? Well, first of all, I’m alive. That may come as a surprise. It occured to me not long after I was marooned here that perhaps nobody knows that. No one has come looking for me, and why would they? If any rescue parties did go looking for the Albatross, I doubt they’d come this far south. Not in winter. But I did in fact survive the ship going down. I don’t think anybody else did. The Dry Valleys People didn’t find anyone else on the shore, alive or dead. I try not to think about that too much, but, to be honest, it still has me kind of fucked up.

Oh, that’s the other things. I’ve made contact with the Dry Valleys People. I am, as the return address indicates, currently living with them. They have welcomed me, rather reluctantly, and I’ll be able to remain at least until the first sunrise of spring. This was not necessarily a widely popular decision, and I’ve come to learn that the political situation among the DVP is rather complicated. They have always guarded their isolation and their independence, and they’re keen to keep guarding it in the future, but there are some among them who worry how long that will really be possible. I think this is something Dr. Wright foresaw, and tried to warn them about in the letter he sent with me. But as you might expect, this is something a large part of their community doesn’t want to hear or even think about, and my presence here is definitely fraught.

As for my original mission… well, it’s an unqualified success, despite the difficulties. I’ve learned a lot. The language, to start with. You won’t believe this, but they speak Old English here. No, not thee and thou and maketh yon Old English. Not Chaucer, even. Older. From their books and what they’ve told me, their ancestors used the West Saxon dialect of Old English, as spoken about the year 1000 AD, as the basis for the language they taught their children. Dr. Wright knew this, of course. That’s how he was able to communicate them and win their trust; he showed an affinity for the same history and the same long-term perspective they cared about. If it seems weird that a bunch of people would move to Antarctica, forsake almost every modern convenience, and deliberately teach their kids a dead language that would be useless in the wider world, well, all I can say I guess is that humans have done a lot of weird shit for a lot of weird reasons throughout history. I think I am beginning to understand why the ancestors of the DVP did what they did. Some of them have tried to explain it to me, but there is a gap in our worldviews here that is difficult to bridge.

One of the DVP that I have befriended is a poet named Leofric. His sister, Leofe, taught me the language, but I’ve learned a lot more about their literature from him. It’s primarily an oral literature, although they do write some of it down. They like long, semi-narrative poetry that draws heavily on the imagery of the natural world, and I would say that it owes something to the ancient Anglo-Saxon poetry they keep in their books, except that, of course, the environment here is nothing like the environment of England one thousand years ago. But there are still some poetic traditions they have inherited from those earlier examples. For instance, their world is harsh, and unforgiving, and from a certain angle looks like a world in decline. The ancient English (so I am told) were surrounded by great Roman ruins they spoke of as being the work of metaphorical giants; here, they have the ruins of two hundred years of scientific and industrial exploration of the Antarctic coast. And their world, too, is enclosed by a vast cold sea, although this one has penguins in it at least.

Aside from the language, the founders of the DVP don’t seem to have intended to recreate medieval English society. There are no kings. There is a semi-formal system of village headship by seniority, but the social hierarchy is very flat. Marriage, inheritance, and choice of occupation all take place on fairly egalitarian terms, and their strictest taboos surround the sharing of labor and resources, not sexuality or religion. I wonder how much of their customs are the result of gradual cultural evolution, or some deliberate effort at creating a planned community. There are lots of funny Utopian experimental communities out there, but most tend to fail after a generation. In a way, this one couldn’t fail, because they had no way to leave Antarctica. They had to make it work. Is this what a real utopian project looks like after six or seven generations?

But honestly, one of the most fascinating aspects of the DVP is their material culture. As you might expect, their day-to-day existence is profoundly shaped by the environment they live in. Their houses are all heavy stone, designed to trap scarce heat, and arranged around the village halls as a windbreak against the dry katabatic gales that sweep the McMurdo Valleys clear of ice. Despite this being one of the driest locations on Earth, it’s still a better habitat for them than the glaciers of the Antarctic lowlands, or the rough, icy terrain of the mountains--here, you can actually build, and you don’t need skis and snowshoes to get around. But, as a consequence, much of their most important infrastructure is underground.

I don’t know if the ancestral DVP brought the right tools with them or if they scavenged them once here, but they have accumulated a small stockpile of laser borers, ultrasonic chisels, and crystalsteel digging equipment that they use to carve out underground chambers in the hills as meeting places and ritual sites. But they don’t do their agriculture there; that happens in networks of buried trenches just below the villages, where they grow cold-resistant mosses and lichens to supplement a meat-based diet, and what seems to be a form of genegineered fibergrass they use to weave their clothing and tapestries, and to make books.

Their art is very beautiful. Their coats, books, and tapestries--even their stone carvings--all depict elaborate lineate forms of plants and animals, inherited I suppose from ancestral memory, since none of the organisms in question are found in Antarctica. They also make images depicting the mountains, of course, and the sea, and the animals that live on the coast; even some of the coastal settlements, as seen from far off. They’re often abstracted, but these images are geographically grounded: they’re not just “generic mountains” or “generic coastline,” they’re specific mountains, specific coastlines, and they add up--if you are exposed to them every day of your life growing up--to something like a conceptual map of all of Victoria Land. It seems that if you dropped an average adult DVP individual anywhere from Oates Land to the Queen Elizabeth Range, they could probably find their way home, even during the dark months of winter.

(Oh! And the dark months! You’d think they’d be depressing, but I never imagined in my life I would see such a sight as the aurora australis, or even the clear polar stars! I can’t describe it to you. Maybe Leofric could, if I could do justice to his verse.)

They’re very communitarian, and great emphasis is placed on making sure no one goes without, but the price of that is, apparently, extremely elaborate dispute-resolution mechanisms; for a culture without courts, government, or attorneys, they are remarkably bureaucratic. Each physical object seems to have its own laws attached to it. Some may be shared by all objects of that type--for instance, if you need an electric firestarter, you always go to the house windward of yours to ask if they have one. If they don’t, you go to the next, and so on; firestarters pass from house to house, as needed, but only in one direction. Other objects may have completely unique rules. There is a knife with an elaborately carved handle meant to be used only by left-handed people. I don’t know why; nobody I asked knew, either. But that was the custom, and it was scrupulously obeyed. As a rule, the more elaborately decorated an object, the more particular the rules associated with it, but the elaboration of the object doesn’t seem to connote anything about the rules. It only marks it out as somehow special. The rules themselves are transmitted orally. All of these rules at bottom are about making sure that resources are evenly distributed--making sure nobody has to walk too far in bitterly cold weather to find a firestarter, for instance--and even the ones that don’t make sense now probably were created for good reason. For instance, the southpaw knife. Their knives for carving meat all have handles that curve in one way, to help separate flesh from bone, and I suspect that one is the result of a left-handed steelsmith getting fed up with with tools he couldn’t use very well. The blade is that of a carving-knife, though the handle attached to it is straight. The handle was probably later replaced when it broke, and somebody needed the knife for a different purpose--but the custom attached to it remained the same.

This system of sharing is, if anything, even more scrupulously observed when there’s a windfall. We went on a salvage expedition a month ago and brought back some much-needed supplies, and they spent days working out what would go where, first to each village and then, once we got back to the High Settlement, each house in each village--and even then, this was just what went to who first. Anything that’s not a finite supply, like food, will get passed from house to house. Leofric tells me that a few years ago, a whale--an entire blue whale, actually--beached itself to the north, and they had to have a weeklong assembly (on the beach, next to the whale, natch) to decide what do with every scrap of meat and bone. They still talk about the arguments that went down at the Whale Parliament sometimes (for which their word is hwaelthing, by the way. Literally it means exactly what it looks like: “whale-thing.”). Funny thing is, they also very carefully manage arguments in these discussions. That’s not normally the case--if two people have an argument and what to physically fight each other about it, that’s considered their business. But when it comes to disputes about food or metal or tools, everybody is very keen to show how Not Mad they are, even if they’re actually seething about it on the inside. And if voices get raised, people get hustled aside, and the whole matter is dropped completely until everybody has a chance to calm down. This looks like a system that was either deliberately designed to keep fights from breaking out and feelings getting permanently hurt, or one that sprung up after some nasty experiences of actual fights. I suspect the latter. It’s all very informal, but there’s a lot of social pressure that enforces it. The price for division and discord in an environment this hard to live in would be death, and I think all their social institutions are built around that reality.

I will admit, this has not been the easiest experience. I mean, there’s the almost dying part, and the part where all my cybernetics are broken, and I had a bad bout of something flulike a few weeks ago and almost died again, but I don’t actually mean the physical hardship. It is a more isolating experience than I thought it would be, being the lone outsider in such a close-knit community. Everyone knows everybody and everything, except me. They all have their own jokes and stories and long-running feuds, and they can communicate a great deal to one another with just a glance, and I’m left wondering what just happened when everybody laughs at something, or a fight breaks out. I have struggled sometimes to learn the language. I mean, I’ve had no other choice, and it’s amazing what you can learn when your survival depends on it, but even now I still sometimes find myself struggling to communicate ideas, or staying silent even when there is something I might want to say, just because I can’t find the words. It’s infuriating not being able to express yourself well, and maybe for good reason I sometimes think they all see me as this hapless idiot who almost got herself killed, who they have to put up with until the spring as a result.

Okay, I mean, I kind of am that. But I am also genuinely interested in their society, in the DVP as individuals, in their stories and their history. But I feel like the best I can hope for is being kind of a mascot. Or a well-meaning but dim-witted pet. A Labrador or something.

Not that I haven’t made friends. I would say Leofric is a friend. The salvagers--Eadwig and Andrac--they’re friends. And I seem to have won at least the grudging toleration of the ones like Aelfric who initially wanted to leave me to die. But sometimes I think I’ve made a connection, somehow bridged the unbridgeable gulf between my life experience and the world of the DVP, only to find out I’ve done no such thing. I thought Leofe was a friend; but now she’s not speaking to me, and she’s left the High Settlement for one of the other valleys. I don’t know why, and the others just shrug when I ask them.

Ugh. This is turning into whining. Now I know I’ll never send it. Sorry. It’s been a long day. It’s amazing how tired you can get when your muscles can’t rely on your augs to help them do shit.

But I need to find a way to bridge that gap. I mean really bridge it. Because I feel like I’m starting to understand something the DVP aren’t ready to hear. Their ancestors came to Antarctica at a time when the rest of the world wasn’t much interested in it. It was a wasteland, so sure, let’s treat it as an international, shared territory. Nobody goes there but scientists and the occasional tourist. And during the Collapse, not even that--Antarctica was truly empty for the first time in a hundred and fifty years when the ancestors of the DVP came to its shores. But it isn’t anymore. And it won’t ever be a real wasteland again. Every year the mining consortia move a little further down the Transantarctic Mountains. Every year a new outpost pops up on the coast, more ships come to Port Alexander, more icebreakers cut through the polar sea. Antarctica is warmer now that it’s been at any time in the past. Heck, without some global warming, I don’t think the Dry Valleys would be habitable. But that means more exposed rock, more open ground to build on, more people coming to the continent to work on the mining platforms or the offshore factories, and one day, I think, they’re going to come here.

What will the DVP do when that happens? This isn’t North Sentinel Island, which nobody ever goes to because there’s no reason. There’s gold in the hills here--the DVP make jewelry out of it--and maybe other precious metals, and you could build a geothermal station on Mount Erebus and power a small town, if you wanted to build some autofactories. The Antarctic Authority exists to promote “science and industry,” but with a big emphasis on industry. And by science they mostly mean, like, watching penguins bone and building telescopes at the South Pole. Not soft stuff like anthropology. And certainly not protecting three valleys full of cessionist oddballs whose parents had an unreasonable fondness for dead languages.

I think Dr. Wright knew this. I think maybe he tried to warn the DVP when he was here, but back then the danger was even further away. And it’s hard to get people to pay attention to danger that seems far away, even if it might be an existential threat. And when dealing with that danger would require you to completely change the only life you’d ever known… well, that’s a hard sell. The DVP don’t really like change. I can’t blame them. But one day things are going to change here, and if they’re not prepared for it, it could get really ugly, really fast. It’s one thing to shut yourself away when the world is ignoring you. It’s another when the world comes knocking.

If I think I can persuade them, I’m going to talk to the elders here, Aelfric and Wulf. Some of the DVP have had very fleeting contact with outsiders before me. I think one of them should come with me in the spring, as a sort of emissary. I’m not sure who they should talk to, yet. Maybe the Authority. Maybe somebody in Port Alexander’s local government? Or maybe we should just try to tell their story directly to the world. That might bring the DVP more attention than they’d like, but better a little good attention now than a lot of bad attention later. I would have asked Leofe--she’s smart, she’s tough, she could handle the culture shock--but that’s not an option now. Something to think about, anyway.

Well. I hope this letter finds the imaginary version of you well, my love to the imaginary family &c, hope the undergrads aren’t giving you too much trouble this year. If for some reason you do find this letter--like I freeze to death on my way to the weather station in September and they find this document on my corpse--please forgive my stubbornness, my insistence on going on this stupid trip, and any worry I’ve caused you as a result. And if I really am dead, please tell everybody I died doing something badass, like, I dunno, fighting a polar bear. I guess those are extinct and they never lived in Antarctica anyway, but something along those lines. Make it good.

All the best,

Kate

#tanadrin's fiction #*blows party horn*#sorry for the epistolary chapter #but it's a great way to do gratuitous expository worldbuilding

10 notes · View notes

autodidact-adventures · 5 years

Text

English History (Part 4): Bronze Age

Bronze Age (2500 – 800 BC)

Around 2200 BC, the first stone circle was created at Stonehenge. This change from wood to stone may have been part of a great cultural movement, one that resulted in the building of monumental enclosures in other sites; the decline of ancestor worship; and bouts of warfare between opposing groups.

The bodies of two adults (male and female) and two children have been found in a single grave in Peterborough. In Dorset, several bodies were found lying in a ditch, with a rampart fallen on top of them. One of them had been killed by an arrow.

The construction of Stonehenge was the largest program of public works in the history of England, and the most drawn-out. The stone circle built in 2200 BC was a series of bluestones, mostly igneous in origin, and considered to have magical healing properties.

Around 2100 BC, the bluestones were taken down and replaced by 30 sarsen stones, in a circle around five pairs of trilithons, which were themselves arranged in a horseshoe pattern. At around the same time, a wooden henge (a circular monument) of 24 obelisks was built less than 800m away from the stone circle. This may have been a burial centre or the site of some other ritual activity.

Bluestonehenge (another henge & stone circle) was built 1.6km to the south-east, along the bank of the Avon River. A large village was built, less than 3.2km away – this may have been a ritual centre, a place of healing, a lodging for pilgrims, or a home for those who set up the sarsen stones. Clearly Salisbury Plain was the site of communal and spiritual settlement on a very large scale.

Digital reconstruction of Bluestonehenge. No stone remains aboveground.

Also around 2100 BC, the Amesbury Archer was buried. He is also called the “king of Stonehenge”. His grave contained over 100 artifacts, including gold ornaments, copper knives, boar tusks and pots. His body was crouched in a foetal position, and flint arrowheads were scattered over him.

The Amesbury Archer would have been a tribal chieftain, but oxygen isotope analysis has shown that he grew up in the colder regions of Northern Europe. It is not known why a foreign king was buried on Salisbury Plain. His body shows evidence of an abscess and a painful bone infection. He may have been on pilgrimage, or he may have crossed the sea to be healed. Or he may have ruled here as one of the tribal chieftains who were not necessarily confined to one region (as there were no countries or nations as we have now).

The Amesbury Archer and grave-goods.

Stonehenge's last construction phase was around 1600 BC. Two circles of standing stones were planned, but only the pits/holes were dug for them. So the structure of Stonehenge has changed over 1,200 years, and possibly its purpose as well. It may have been a burial ground, a site of public ceremonial and ritual, a centre of pilgrimage and ritual healing, a great observatory and celestial clock. We do not know.

However, in all of these ears, Stonehenge is evidence of a controlling power that could organize many people in this project. There was a hierarchical society with an elite group at the top (tribal or priestly) that could force or persuade thousands of people into building Stonehenge (and other ritual sites). Stonehenge would have taken millions of hours of labour. The bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in south-west Wales, about 320km away. Land, material resources and labour were governed by some form of central control.

Stonehenge quarry.

It is possible that during the 1,200 years of Stonehenge's construction phases, communal burials were being replaced by individual burials – the Amesbury Archer is one example. In some graves, the chieftain's body is accompanied by weapons; in others, the body is surrounded by goods. These would have been the graves of leaders and high priests, often buried with their immediate families. England had become an aristocratic society, rather than a tribal one.

Stonehenge today.

-------

The Bronze Age cultivation of the landscape can still be seen, especially from the air. The banks & ditches of hundreds of rectangular fields can be seen. They were photographed from the air for the first time in 1929, and a lost world was revealed.

The uplands and downlands of southern Britain were laid out in fields, with hedges and stone walls stretching for miles. Among these ditched fields were drove-ways and waterholes. Central planning would have been essential for this level of land planning. Thousands of square miles of land were laid out in this way.

This intense cultivation is the strongest evidence for a steady population increase. By 1900 BC (600yrs into the Bronze Age) there were perhaps a million people, and when Julius Caesar invaded in 55 BC (near the end of the Iron Age), there were over 2 million people.

England was an agricultural society, with regional variations. The cultivated land has continued to be used as productive arable land ever since. Woodland was cleared, and pastureland was created with grass. There were more sheep than there would be in 1600 AD. There was little monumental construction – working the land was now a more important activity.

There were settlements everywhere, most of them situated away from the monumental sites. Single households and small hamlets were common. Enclosures were surrounded by a fence or ditch. Hut circles were groups of round stone houses with beehive roofs. People who lived there burned peat, and the hut circles included farmyards (or perhaps they were nearby?)

The Bronze Age people buried their dead in family units, cremating the bodies and placing the ashes in decorated urns. The cemeteries of the Late Bronze Age (from c. 1300 BC) are known as urn fields.

Men wore a tunic known as a “kirtle”, with a woollen cloak above it. Women wore a tunic and jacket, also covered by a woollen cloak. Their shoes were made of skin, and the men wore woollen caps. Higher-status women wore elaborate jet necklaces. One grave has evidence of a woman who had a concealed pad to bolster her hair. Higher-status men and women wore gold & bronze ornaments, and blue beads imported from Egypt. They also imported amber jewellery from the Baltic region. There was quite a lot of international trade in Bronze Age England.

The people ate soups, stews and dressed meat; and a type of porridge made of wheat, barley and oats. Alcoholic drinks such as beer and wine were an important part of their diet. They also ate hazelnuts, herbs, seaweed, and varieties of berries.

The focus of ceremony & worship shifted from the sky to the earth. The cultivation & increased use of the land would have increased the importance & significance of fertility rituals. Specific attention was given to water and watery places, including rivers, springs, marshes and fens.

Bronze Age weapons & other artifacts have been found in the Thames. The offerings of weapons, ornaments and bones were kept separate and distinct. At Eton, there are many skulls, but no metal. Tools were left in dry locations, and weapons in wet locations. Wooden platforms & causeways were built beside the river – they were part of the sacred space in which the peoples' priests dwelled.

Leaf-shaped bronze (copper-alloy) sword (Late Bronze Age).

Burial mounds and henge monuments have been located by rivers throughout prehistory. 368 Neolithic axes have been found in the Thames. The Bronze Age river offerings may have been part of a rite to gain the favour of the dead, i.e. part of ancestor worship. If the dead were believed to cross between the world of the living and the world of the dead, they would have a particular affinity with the river – the river would give access to the underworld though many passages, and it springs fresh and renewed froms its source.

During the Bronze Age, the weather was growing cooler and wetter.

Weapons have been found all over England – spearheads, socketed axes, rapiers, and (at a slightly later date) swords. Stirrups have been found; there is evidence of harnesses and bronze fittings for horses. There were chariots as well – traces of wheel ruts have been found at Peterborough that would have supported a vehicle with a width of one metre.

The evidence points to a warrior aristocracy, in a kingdom or group of sub-kingdoms stretching from Dorset to Sussex. The middle & late Bronze Age is roughly contemporaneous with the culture of Homer's Troy, with the same focus on kings & warriors, feasting and ritual battle. It would have been a warrior society with small-scale sporadic fighting between elites, gift exchanges between leaders, and tribute (in the form of food) from the subject population. This would have been one of the reasons why the land was farmed so extensively.

Defended settlements were found everywhere, as well as other enclosures that contained buildings. These were the prototypes for the Iron Age hill forts of southern England. In Dorset, a fence made out of great tree trunks was built around an area of 11 acres (4.4 hectares). It was set in a trench about 3 metres deep.

Strong regional identities & divisions were already being formed. The Thames Valley had access to the European mainland, which gave it an advantage in trade. This helped the region to eclipse the agricultural wealth of the Salisbury Plain. Northern England was focused on stock-raising, whereas southern England focused on cereal production. Trade encouraged interdependence between regions.

Commerce of all kinds was increasing, and this was very important. Trade leads to the growth of civilizations; it enables wars; it encourages technological growth; it creates towns & cities. Some types of swords were manufactured in western France, and ended up in eastern England. Also imported to England were highly-embellished barbecue spits from Spain, metalwork from Mycenae in Greece, and gold ornaments from Ireland.

In turn, England exported linen, woollen fabrics, slaves and hunting dogs to Europe. Children worked in Cornwall's tin mines, using bones and hammer-stones to dig out the ore. The metal was then sent to England's coastal ports for shipment to the continent.

When tin is added to molten copper, bronze is formed. The new technology changed everything, from cutting down forests to building houses to fighting. There were even bronze razors, with oil used as a lubricant for shaving.

Many Bronze Age settlements & cemeteries used the same sites as the Neolithic Period, and Bronze Age settlements were continuously in use throughout the Irone Age. The Iron Age people consistently respected the burial mounds and boundary lines of those who had come before them.

8 notes · View notes

bluewatsons · 5 years

Text

Jeanne Willette, Julia Kristeva and Abjection, Art History Unstuffed (October 11, 2013)

Julia Kristeva’s Powers of Horror (1980/1982) was a turning point in her career and in postmodern theory because she re-located the origin of psychoanalysis in the notion of abjection. Following in the footsteps of Luce Irigaray, this book was written expressively, in a “lightning style” and explores the psychoanalytic status of the Mother in terms of “horror,” “love,” melancholy.” There are things that are repulsive and horrible in life, things that are grotesque and formless, but what is their status? Stabbing with her pen, Kristeva replicates the powers of horror itself in her essay, “Approaching Abjection,”

There looms, within abjection, one of those violent, dark re-volts of being, directed against a threat that seems to emanate from an exorbitant outside or inside, ejected beyond the scope of the possible, the tolerable, the thinkable. It lies there, quite close, but it cannot be assimilated. It beseeches, worries, and fascinates desire, which, nevertheless, does not let itself be seduced. Apprehensive, desire turns aside; sickened, it rejects. A certainty protects it from the shameful—a certainty of which it is proud holds—on to it. But simultaneously, just the same, that impetus, that spasm, that leap is drawn toward an elsewhere as tempting as it is condemned. Unflaggingly, like an inescapable boomerang, a vortex of summons and repulsion places the one haunted by it literally beside himself.

Kristeva decided to write about that which is been repressed, of that at which one does not want to look or smell or experience–the skim on milk, fingernail parings, waste, cadavers and so on. She contrasts the ob-ject to the ab-ject, which is connected to the Freudian mechanism or process of repression, denial and repudiation that are part of the formation of the human subject. She explained,

The one by whom the abject exists is thus a deject who places (himself), separates (himself), situates (himself), and therefore strays instead of getting his bearings, desiring, belonging, or refusing..Instead of sounding himself as to his “being,” he does so concerning his place: “Where am I?” instead of “Who am I?” For the space that engrosses the deject, the excluded, is never one, nor homogeneous, nor totalizable, but essentially divisible, fold- able, and catastrophic. A deviser of territories, languages, works, the deject never stops demarcating his universe whose fluid confines—for they are constituted of a non-object, the abject—constantly question his solidity and impel him to start afresh. A tireless builder, the deject is in short a stray.

For Kristeva, the abject is part of one’s personal archaeology or buried consciousness. Abjection is part of the earliest and forgotten struggle to separate from the mother who is reluctant to recognize the realm of the symbolic or the law of the Phallus. Before the intervention of the Symbolic, there is a prior impulse compelled to expel the Mother and the mother becomes the Abject. But the symbolic (intervention of the Father between the mother and child) alone is not enough to ensure the separation. In order for the child to become detached from the mother, the Mother must be abjected: “The abject would thus be the object of primal repression.” The Mother is gradually rejected through rituals of cleanliness, toilet training, eating habits and so on. Although through these lessons in “horror,” the Mother is abjected, in signifying horror, reconciliation with the maternal body is possible.

The human subject is founded upon the imposition of the Symbolic Law of the Father and the abjection of the mother to prevent incest. Inspired by the rejection of the maternal body, the (unstable) prohibition of incest includes autoeroticism and is located in what Kristeva, borrowing a term from Plato, called the chora. Imagine the chora as a receptacle, a place where the repressed is pent up. The chora will, of course, return, but it is held in tenuous check by the sign or the image the subject has formed narcissistically of itself. As a result the abject is a “crisis of narcissism.” Kristeva asserted,

The abject shatters the wall of repression and its judgments. It takes the ego back to its source on the abominable limits from which, in order to be, the ego has broken away—it assigns it a source in the non-ego, drive, and death. Abjection is a resurrection that has gone through death (of the ego). It is an alchemy that transforms death drive into a start of life, of new signifiance. The abject is related to perversion.

Kristeva asserts that sex and violence form the primal intersection for humanity, and women are the victims of the symbolic order. The Murder of the Mother and the Prohibition of Incest is the precondition of the emergence of human subjectivity and the formation of society. The division or separation of mother and child makes up the two sides of the sacred. There would be no sacred if it were not for the ritual murder performed symbolically to prevent incest. For the Mother to not be the object of desire, she must be abjected and associated with menstrual blood, hair, and bodily wastes. Maternal milk binds the child to the mother and becomes the sign for incest. Because pollution outside the body threatens the identity of the body, these extrusions of the body render the body indistinct and ambiguous and the body must be subjected to ritual acts to ward off defilement.

Kristeva’s theories on the Maternal are ambiguous. First, as a theorist, she was deeply implicated in the male-based intellectual discourse of post-war Paris and her “feminist” credentials are unclear, and second, if, like Irigaray and other women of that era, she is entangled in Freudian-Lacanian theory to what extent can she ever theorized an independent existence for the female? Is Kristeva explaining, in theoretical language, the very real ways in which women are abjected in society: the prohibition of the advertising of “female” products on television until after ten in the evening, male demands that all female body hair be exfoliated, and the collective horror over menstruation, and so on? Or is she simply discussing the psychology of language in a way that in elaborating Lacan foregrounds the abject, an unwritten but necessary element in the formation of the subject?

As John Lechte pointed out in his book on Julia Kristeva, Kristeva privileges menstrual blood and excrement, which stem from the Maternal or the Pre-Symbolic. This abject is not controlled by the Symbolic but by energy drives. Abjection becomes internalized through language and spoken through the symbolic order. Lechte stressed the liminal condition of the abject: it is neither inside nor outside–human waste, properly not seen, is suddenly expelled. But excrement, like mother’s milk is privileged for it is part of the inside/outside which marks off the boundaries of the human body. Over time, there is a steady repression of the maternal element in favor of a political and social rationality of the subject and of the society. The abject becomes the dark side of narcissism: the ambiguous, the in-between, the unassailable, in other words, all that has had to be repressed for the subject to separate from the mother and to enter into society. But even though it is deposited in the chora, the abject defies boundaries, is resistant to unity, and disturbs the identity, order, and system that is necessary to create the subject. To maintain these tenuous boundaries, the abject is objectified or projected forward and away onto, as Kristeva said, the corpse, waste, filth, the traitor, the liar, the criminal, the rapist, the hypocrite, the amoralist and other social undesirables.

As Kristeva explained in Revolution in Poetic Language,

The chora is not yet a position that represents something for someone (i.e., it is not a sign); nor is it aposition that represents someone for another position (i.e., it is not yet a signifier either); it is, however, generated in order to attain to this signifying position.

The chora is the maternal receptacle for that which has been repressed/abjected and is labeled the “Semiotic,” the primal language of the Mother as opposed to the “Symbolic,” the social language of the Father. In locating the semiotic with the body and specifically with the body of the mother, Kristeva, according to Judith Butler’s 1983 critique, “The Body Politics of Julia Kristeva,” lapses into essentialism and in retelling Freud’s “family romance,” Kristeva also leaves out the homosexual experience. Indeed as Evelien Geerts pointed out in 2011, in “Women’s Time,” Kristeva seems to agree with Lacan that “Woman does not exist.” On the other hand as Geerts added, there is a potential for subversion in the ideas of Kristeva: in locating the origins of language (the semiotic) in the Maternal might, as Slavoj Zizek, suggested work against the Phallocentric.

According to Kristeva, “Corruption is the socialized appearance of the abject.” Whether spiritual or social or political corruption implies a “cancer” or alien growth within the bounded object. As a social act and a rejection of the symbolic, Associated with the female or that which is unincorporated into Lawful society, abjection is always on the wrong side of the Law (of the Father. The question becomes how to reincorporate the female and the abject and separate the pre-Symbolic from the criminal? Kristeva unhinges the binary oppositions through semiotic language as a form of music, leading to an infinitization of meaning (the Semiotic). Disruptive laughter is a truly innovative practice; pleasure is the lifting of inhibitions and is invested in the production of the new and obeys laughter’s logic. Semiotic practice “pluralizes”, “pulverizes”, and “musicates” all ossified forms. According to Kristeva,

When practice is not laughter, there is nothing new; where there is nothing new, practice cannot be provoking: it is at best a repeated, empty act.

Art, for Kristeva, avant-garde practice can transform society. The work of art can explore aspects of the feminine and the masculine. Mimesis is not the woman or the feminine but the constitution and de-constitution of the subject. Kristeva posited a third way, following the failures of first and second-generation feminism, suggesting that aesthetic practices should explore and construct the singularity of every speaking being. Subjectivity can become an open system, and art can become an individuating experience of limits. Kristeva thought that a genuine dialectical materialism could be an artistic challenge—a transgression of the historical forms of the Symbolic. In other words, she is suggesting a transgression of or an inversion of a dialectic, based upon rejection and exclusion. As Kristeva stated,

This conception of the ethical function of art separates us, in a radical way, from one that would commit art to serving as the representation of a so-called progressive ideology or avant-garde socio-historical philosophy.

…no language can sing unless it confronts the Phallic Mother…

As Sarah Beardsworth pointed out in her 2009 article, “Love’s Lost Labors: Subjectivity, Art, and Politics,”

The subjective process that is the essence of art gains its significance only and through being a remedy for this blockage. While Kristeva’s diagnose of the crisis of meaning and values pertains to modernity, the blockage of subjective process has deep roots in Western culture The idea of artistic sublimation means that, in her view, art and literature have the capacity to work it through.

Because art comes from the repressed and primal loss of the Maternal, Kristeva proposes that the work of art is at the heart of the Mother. As John Lechte explained, “Art is the délire manqué that keeps social psychosis at bay.” Although the artist’s creation, as it is commonly known, has to do with the Phallic Mother, the male artist, according to Irigaray, produces works of art that reinforce the inferior status of women in patriarchy. Art is the mother castrated in the symbolic, but because the Maternal is on the side of the Material, the Mother can be alluded to through the materiality of the work of art. Kristeva seems to assert that the patriarchy and the capitalist system which is its manifestation seeks to repress the materiality of the semiotic and that art becomes a way to disrupt symbolically–through the Language of the Father–by using the texture of paint, or the smoothness of marble, or the intensity of a color, or the hand of a fabric to express the repressed primal tactility experienced through fusion with the body of the Mother.

The “dialectic” of Kristeva would place the thesis of reason and logic against that which has been suppressed, hidden away in the chora. In comparison to the fixity of Symbolic meaning, she stressed Process over Identification, heterogeneity over the signifier, and struggle over structure. By introducing the heterogeneous rupture of poetic language into a capitalist society, Kristeva is restating the arguments against totalization and “identity thinking.” The artistic creation would become “poetic language,” which is a signifying practice, and transgression defines the practice of the avant-garde artist. Indeed transgression becomes a “key moment in practice” through which poetic language is put in process.

#art #art history #critique #dialectic #julia kristeva #abjection #postmodernism

3 notes · View notes

tarotmum13 · 5 years

Text

Add a touch of Magick to your Day!

We can all use some extra positivity in our lives, can’t we?

Well, what if I were to tell you there is a simple way to add a bit of zing to your day? And it is SO EASY, you’ll be wondering why you weren’t doing this all along…

I am talking about Magick Spells…

Yes! You heard me – Magick! (With an added “k” to distinguish it from stage-magic, the illusions and tricks meant to baffle and confuse us) – And no, you do not have to be a Witch/Pagan/Wiccan/Druid to turn your hand to this kind of Enchantments – It really just boils down to “Spelling” everyday items with INTENT.

You can put a Spell on just about anything you can think of:

You write every appointment down in your diary, but then forget to look at it? Spell your diary with a remembrance spell! You want to feel confident going in to that meeting at work? Spell your lipstick or the coffee in your travel-cup! You want to snack a little less throughout the day? Spell your sandwich to sustain you longer! There really is no limit to the amount of Magick you can surround yourself with.

“How do I do this?”, you ask? Well, you just need to start charging your daily necessities (or luxuries) with the firm, focussed Intention that they WILL have added Magickal properties and benefits. And it is not complicated: hold the item in your hand and think about what you want it to do. Try and formulate things in a CLEAR, ACTIVE, POSITIVE manner (just C.A.P. it ).

For instance, when charging your lipstick (or chapstick, if like me you don’t wear a lot of make-up), hold it in your hands – focus, and say: “I feel confident!” (rather than “Maybe this can make me feel more confident” or “I would like to feel less insecure”). You have basically just spoken an Incantation! An Incantation is any word or series of words spoken with the INTENT of doing Magick. Now, every time you put on that lipstick, you will be reminded of this – Believing is key!

If you are Spelling items for Loved ones rather than for yourself, you would of course refer to them as “you” when placing your intent. You could Enchant your child’s bicycle-helmet, for instance. Say: “You are safe”, then also repeat that to them whenever you are strapping on their helmet to re-affirm your Incantation. Or bewitch the bedding in your hamster’s cage when you are cleaning it with a “You are happy and Healthy” Spell!

That is really all you need to do – if you send these positive affirmations out there, The Universe/Spirit/God/Your Higher Self (or whatever you place your Trust in) WILL receive them, confirm them and radiate them back to you amplified. You basically reap what you sow, attract what you release.

If you want to give your Spelled object an extra little boost, you can leave it with a crystal overnight to enhance it’s vibrations and cleanse it’s energy. A clear quartz or selenite, rose quartz or amethyst are generally good choices. You can choose a more specific crystal for your intended use if you like. I will be posting a simple colour-coded system for choosing the right crystal very soon! It makes sense to Spell your items according to their normal use. It feels logical to Intend your lipstick to make you feel confident, as it was already intended to make you feel better about yourself. If you want to Spell your pillow in to making you feel less hungry, that might be a tad more difficult!

Some things lend themselves exceptionally well to being Spelled, as they have magickal properties already!

Like tea, for instance – the making of tea is a ritual in itself and you can easily stir in some added Magick. You can focus on your intent whilst you are getting your cup ready and the water is boiling, as you pour the water on to the tea, imagine it steaming with your added energy and belief – stir the tea clockwise as you speak your incantation: “I feel calm” or ” My stomach settles” or “We bond over this cup of tea” – whatever you wish.

If you are so inclined, feel free to embellish your Incantation! You could say something like: “As I stir this honeyed-tea, all good things will come to me!” or “Blessed be my daily Tea, may it soothe and nourish me”. Be creative! This is some good old Kitchen-Witch Magick right here!

Tea has the added benefit of you being able to choose the type of tea that will enhance your Spell (chamomile, mint, hibiscus,…). If you are going to make your tea at the office, you can spell your teabag beforehand – you can even write your Spell-word on the label (or draw a Sigil)!Salt (often used to cast protective circles or in purification rituals) is another magickal ingredient that makes a perfect vehicle for a Spell, along with herbs, spices and oils or things like sugar or honey. All these ingredients absorb psychic energy very well and so are great conduits for your Magickal Intent!

There are also Actions that are perfect for Spell-work: Knitting, crochet or macramé are all about Knot-Magick. Knit your love and affection in to every stitch of that scarf you are making! Writing is a powerful tool, so Spell your pen and paper and you can infuse your essay/project/letter with positive intent.

Sweeping the house is a wonderful opportunity to sweep out old, stagnant, negative energy. So Spell that broom, Witches!!

Lighting a candle or incence is a great way to fill your home with light, warmth and positive vibes. Taking a bath is an unmistakable cleansing ritual. Don’t forget to put a Spell on your bath-salt! Or you can even add some of your Spelled chamomile-tea bags to the water.

Cooking a meal to nourish yourself or your family is the best Magick of all! Sprinkle in the love, pour in the understanding, stir through the support,…

Making preserves is a fantastic opportunity to fill those jars with happiness-jam and canned contentment-peaches, so you will have a supply when you need it the most. Those of you who read the cards, like I do, will already know how important setting the right Intention is to get the desired result! We do this every time we are preparing to lay out a Spread or even pull just one card to reflect on our day. It really is essential to become more aware of how our Intentions, moods and feelings impact on the everyday items we use or the chores we complete. Our energy rubs off on everything we touch, use and create.

Imagine you are preparing your lunchbox and flask of tea in the morning… if you are grumbling away about how badly you slept, how tired you are and how much you do NOT want to go in to work today, then at lunchtime you will be eating bad-mood-sandwiches and drinking bitter resentment-tea! You are basically consuming all that negative energy you were exhaling this morning…

Now be honest, wouldn’t you rather be biting in to a feel-good-sandwich and wash it down with some positivi-tea? I know I would! And I am not even going to apologise for that very obvious and cheesy pun…

So PLEASE people, BE MINDFULL and spread that Love on thick, my friends! Now, I know we spoke about using POSITIVE language for your Incantations ( I do, I will, I am, I can), but I can think of one or two situations where “I DON’T” might actually be helpful. Spelling your cigarettes with “I don’t need this cigarette”, for example, would certainly be beneficial to both your health and your bank account!

I would like to leave you with a list of items you can enchant and bewitch:

Your lipstick/chapstick/lipgloss/lipbalm – your shampoo, shower-gel, soap, scrub, bathsalts etc. – your diary, wallet, mobile phone, housekeys, pen, notebook,… – your tea, coffee, water, …. – your meals, snacks, sandwiches – your herbs and spices, honey, preserves,… – your pet’s food, water and bedding – your candles, incense, sage,… – your medicines and ointments – your child’s pacifier, milk, favourite stuffed toy or blanket – your bed and pillow – your sweeping brush, cleaning products, washing-up liquid… – there must be 1001 other things you can charm! See if you can think of some more…

Go on! Give it a try and add some Magick to your life!!!

Xxx

(This is a post I wrote last summer on Wordpress and forgot to post here! Hope you enjoy it!)

#daily magick #manifestation #affirmation #intent

13 notes · View notes

agameofsouls · 6 years

Text

backstory // jackson + lyra

so, jackson and lyra are ocs that i created for a group rp that i used to run a year or so back. the history and lore was really really deep, and i actually spent months writing it and tying little pieces together to make a blend of rural folk village / supernatural monsters / scifi horror whatever that made me really happy to think about and plan out.

i actually had an entire notebook filled with different arcs and conflicts i wanted the group to work through, including a huntress, a dragon, blood spells, etc. unfortunately, we only got about half way through the huntress before things died out due to busy personal lives, and what have you.

this is just a small directory and explanation to certain parts of that world that are integral to the development of jackson and lyra as characters, and things that they have experienced from their old home, as well as links to posts from the group page with even more stories and information.

mostly, this is for my benefit so i can sort of feel better referencing their backstories knowing that this exists for anyone to read that’s interested.

also, i just really want my old favorite stories to see the light of day again. nightmare was honestly so important to me as a writer, lmao.

NOTE. this is a long post!

the town itself

Nightmare has been around for two hundred and forty horrific years. It was originally created by the legendary group called The Eleven, which consisted of: Five witches, two vampires, three werewolves, one necromancer, and several children belonging to most of the members.

The story is that left their homes in Salem, followed by groups of hunters, and traveled all the way down to Tennessee before disappearing into the Smoky Mountains, losing their would-be killers forever. It took them a while and a lot of settling down and uprooting before finally deciding on a permanent home, but they did it, and here we are: hidden, secret, and safe. ( more here )

essentially, the town is self sufficient, isolated in deep within the smoky mountains. there are several sister towns spread across the us, typically either in more wooded areas, or deep within the rarely traveled plains of the midwest, or the deserts of the mojave.

they are connected by ‘trails’ that are only traveled by those in the know, and nomads travel from town to town with goods to trade on a regular basis, and often bring newcomers with them that they found along the way.

the government system is fairly simplistic as well -- each species that resides in nightmare has one representative, whether because they were elected or are the only one of their kind, that sits on a council.

the power is usually passed through the family of the current council member, and doesn’t often switch hands unless something drastic happens. in the case that there are no familial relations of the current council member available, they will select another member of their species as their ‘heir.’

lyra + jackson

in this world, lyra lived a very carefree life. she was a bit of a criminal, and would often get into trouble on purpose just to have the sheriff of the town, tris, arrest her. she developed a crush on him, and they eventually started seeing each other, much to the dismay of lyra’s mother. she hated that tris was older than lyra, as well as a shape shifter. she thought he was dangerous, but lyra wouldn’t hear a bad word against him.

she also had a best friend, a witch named antonia, who she would drag into all sorts of trouble with her. the two were inseparable, except for when the law man came around. lyra never let toni go down with her, and always took the heat. freya always forgave lyra for any wrongdoing she did, and was the kind of mom that instead got upset with the guards rather than her own daughter for her ever growing criminal record.

on the other hand, jackson lived quietly. even in a place like nightmare, necromancers were still feared. their power was different than that of any of the witches, and it was mysterious. it made other people uneasy, and they didn’t have a lot of trust for young or new necromancers like him.

so he typically stayed home, tending to his plants and decorating his house to look like an hgtv model home. he also sold his fruits and veggies in the town center at his little produce stall, and made some extra cash that way. it was a far cry from his previous life, but he liked it.

he made friends slowly, and eventually befriended lyra. the two, along with toni, became close friends and would often spend time in jackson’s home having tea and snacks during the day, and going to parties at night. toni, while she spent her time with jackson and lyra often, still had a slight distrust of jackson, and would often make excuses to not join them on ventures. this left a lot of time for him and lyra to be alone and bond, and he quickly became her second most trusted friend in town.

when shit hit the fan and it was time to leave, they went together, trying to make sense of all the shit they had been through. after everything, they are inseparable, and would probably die for each other. there are very few friends as close as them, and they depend on each other to survive in the outside world.

the problem

For some reason or another, though, our population has started falling, and not because our citizens are leaving, either. Something’s been coming around when we don’t know it and making people drop dead left and right, whether it’s from a sickness or people being outright murdered, we don’t know.

The recent deaths are causing some tensions between groups and have cause productivity to dwindle as well. Some parents won’t send their kids down to the school and community events have begun to see a decrease in attendance as well. The Council is working on finding the source of the problem and a solution, but with even the Elders finding it difficult to work together, some people are afraid that this is the end of Nightmare.

so, basically, there was a sickness spreading, but it was only affecting certain groups, such as the witches and sirens, specifically. it had slowly started to spread to other species as well, enough that a true ‘pattern’ hadn’t been picked up just yet. no one could figure out how it spread, and no one could figure out a cure or a source for it.

there was no magic that could stop it, no potion that could slow it. it seemed to suddenly hit a person, and within a matter of hours to days, they were dead.

what the townspeople didn’t know was that the sickness was entirely created in a lab. freya, the alpha of the werewolf pack and current holder of the werewolf council seat, had been contacted by a mysterious organization from the outside world regarding a research project into special beings.

the organization wanted to study the dna of supernatural beings, to see what made it different from humans, and if it was possible to cure, or if it was possible to weaponize and turn regular humans into these creatures.

they wanted to see if they could modify regular human dna to pass it on like any regular trait and have it manifest in their children, thus manufacturing witches, werewolves, or even hybrids of any of these species. it was a long shot by far, but they were willing to pay for any help.

for a while, she helped the organization by gathering dna samples and sending it off to a drop point. it was harmless. they compensated her well, and she was able to provide the town with wealth and new things that they never had before. but then, operations at the organization switched hands to someone with a little more darker intentions.

this new head had led the scientists in the direction of extermination -- treat the genetic markers like a virus, create a serum that destroys it, kill the monsters, ensure the survival of pure humans. now, this worried freya, and she pulled out almost immediately, until the head made a deal with her -- provide the dna of the creatures you don’t like and we’ll stick with them. your kind will be safe.

she quickly bought into this, and brought her brother in on the situation, and continued to provide dna from witches, shape shifters, and sirens alike, always avoiding her kind. the organization gave her a satellite phone, as described in this post, and she began to poison the town slowly through the well systems.

the huntress

in the midst of all the chaos and fear caused by the sickness in town, something perhaps worse came to nightmare via an old legend called the huntress, fully explained here.

Legend tells of an ancient hunter made immortal and unstoppable by a group of religious witches to destroy the races of monsters. Their chosen Huntress was taken from her life of poverty and misery and used in a forbidden ritual dedicated to the dark gods. During this ritual, half of her soul was ripped from her body and placed in a token of the Huntress, for safe keeping. The gods replaced the missing piece of her mortal soul with pieces of their own, effectively making her one of them, therefore making it impossible for her to die by normal means.

the story ends with the huntress being trapped in a chest, passed down by the bloodlines of the original witches that created and later imprisoned her. a ritual was to be performed during a full moon every century, but that instruction eventually fell to myth and then became hardly a memory, and the whereabouts of the chest were eventually forgotten.

it turns out, like a lot of things do in this town, that the chest ended up in the attic of the council building, just waiting for a little something like the hunter’s moon to come out and let the huntress out to play.

That moment finally came as the moon reached the highest point in the night sky, casting moonbeams through the trees and onto the buildings in town. One in particular hit the attic window of the Council Hall, illuminating the small, dusty area. It rested on the wooden panels of a particularly dusty and battered looking chest that hadn’t been touched since the Founders chucked it into the attic – which was the last time the chest had been touched.

Just minutes after the light of the moon touched the chest, it began to rumble, softly at first, and then violently. The rumbling then spread to the attic itself and then to the building, making ceiling tiles fall and the wood flooring and walls crack. A dark smoke, moving almost like liquid, began to seep from the seams of the chest and surround it, hissing whenever it came into contact with the wood. Finally, the rumbling stopped, the smoke disappeared, and all was silent.

BANG

It sounded as if several canons had gone off in unison, temporarily deafening anyone in the vicinity of the Council Hall. As the sound went off, a burst of magic exploded from the chest, sending wood pieces flying through the attic and either becoming lodged in the walls or blowing holes right through them like a shotgun blast. The burst of magic flew through the entire town, knocking every living being off of their feet and also knocked the wind right from their lungs. Several light bulbs blew out with the blast and windows shattered, and some people even dropped dead, causing more terror and panic than the initial magic had caused itself.

the rest of the huntress returning to this world can be read here!

after her return, one of the ghosts alerted the town to an ongoing crisis by ringing the bells and causing an even bigger alarm than her arrival did. that can be read here, and so can the official death count from the morning after.

this arc was never finished. i like to think that the town eventually solved it, that they were able to find her token and destroy it. i imagine that it was crushed by either tris or toni. but it was in a climactic moment. fire raging around them, the huntress standing with an arrow ready. the hero drops the token, and crushes it beneath their boot.

with a scream, the huntress let a final arrow fly, killing the hero, just as the trapped piece of her mortal soul came flooding back into her, and forcing the immortal bits out with another flash bang of magic. it forces the huntress onto her knees, and another of the heroes, either lyra or jackson, was able to take the sword and kill the huntress with it.

in the end, a majority of the town was killed, and it was evident to most people that the population would never recover from what had happened between the huntress and the sickness. a few dozen people decided to stay and rebuild, having faith that things could ever go back to normal.

others left, whether to rejoin regular society, or to join the other sister towns for a while, it wasn’t specified. but this event essentially blew nightmare off of the supernatural haven map for a while.

it was from this that jackson and lyra decided to leave. they had witnessed so many friends and family members die, and they both wanted out of that life. lyra left behind her mother and her future as alpha of the pack. jackson left his home behind, and off they went.

#( character study ) lyra #( character study ) jackson #( headcanon ) lyra #( headcanon ) jackson

4 notes · View notes

architectnews · 3 years

Text

Leeds Beckett University presents nine architecture and design projects

A "Recycled Fun Palace" and pottery studios for autistic and non-verbal people are included in Dezeen's latest school show by Leeds Beckett University.

Also included is a project that imagines a post-viral Blackpool and another that explores the idea that colonising another planet is the solution to climate change.

Leeds Beckett University

School: Leeds Beckett University, Leeds School of Architecture Courses: BA(Hons) Architecture, BA(Hons) Landscape Architecture and Design, BA(Hons) Interior Architecture and Design, MA Landscape Architecture, Master of Architecture (MArch) Tutors: Claire Hannibal, Tom Vigar, Simon Warren, Keith Andrews, Doreen Bernath, Nick Tyson, John Maccleary, Chris Royffe, Sarah Mills, George Epolito, Mohammad Taleghani, Alia Fadel, Amanda Wanner and Maryam Osman

School statement:

"Leeds School of Architecture questions what architecture and the built environment can contribute to the world we live in from a cultural, social and political point of view. As a result, we have expanded modes of practice, research, and inter-disciplinary work to inform new critical voices and collectively empower creative minds to tackle our current environmental and ethical challenges.

"Our continued school ethos of collaboration enables new design problems and solutions to emerge, and the projects exhibited within this showcase crucially engage with this theme.

"There have been many student successes as a result of the school's continued collective action, studio agendas, and the commitment of its students and course staff teams.

"During 20/21, opportunities for our students to locate their practice in wider contexts included collaborations on projects with Crescent Arts - Scarborough, the Forestry Commission, Henshaws Specialist College, Leeds Art Gallery, Portsmouth University, Temple University - Philadelphia, New Wortley Community Association, CATCH (Community Action to Create Hope) - Harehills, Halifax Opportunities Trust, and MAP Charity, Leeds.

"The work presented brings together student work from across the following programmes: BA(Hons) Architecture, BA(Hons) Interior Architecture, and Design, BA(Hons) Landscape Architecture and Design, MA Landscape Architecture and Master in Architecture (MArch)."

The Survivor's Sanctuary (The Black Plague of Blackpool, The Walking Dead) by Dominic Stewart

"Once a hamlet by the sea, Blackpool emerged as a significant seaside destination for the well-to-do in the nineteenth century. Since this period of boom, however, it has suffered a decline, and although it remains a destination, it currently exists in two states lodged between the permanent – its residents – and the transitory – its fleeting visitors.

"The project imagines a post-viral townscape that questions ideas of community and the fragile state of our urban fabric. Set within a global pandemic, the rebirth of civilisation forces inhabitants to examine historic ways of building whilst developing technologies of energy production.

"The Survivor's Sanctuary proposes a future that challenges ideas of self-sufficiency, sustainable building, and the structural adaptability of reclaimed materials. A testbed for ideas, the success of the future lies in the hands of those who have survived."

Student: Dominic Stewart Course: BA(Hons) Architecture Tutor: Claire Hannibal

The Recycled Fun Palace: Repurposing Philadelphia's Refinery Infrastructure through Community Institutes by Luke Singleton

"Citizen Agency studio projects were located in Philadelphia, USA, commencing with The Edmund N. Bacon Urban Design Awards Student Competition. The site is a 1,300-acre redundant refinery close to Philadelphia's centre. 13 students prepared one group entry titled 'Community Institutes'.

"Our design studio was awarded third prize. From each student's contribution to the competition, a community institute proposition was developed.

"The Recycled Fun Palace reuses a disused gasometer. The immense structure takes on a new role, acting as the framework for a Cedric Price-inspired superstructure. In response to the ever-increasing climate emergency, the new architecture has been constructed by reusing refinery infrastructure."

Student: Luke Singleton Course: BA(Hons) Architecture Tutor: Simon Warren

The Seven Vails of The Lord by Cassie Norrish

"The Abstract Machines studio projects were based in York and explored the following propositional themes. Research into the cultural manifestations of political parties with students defining their position; exploration of the spatial systems through which party organisations could manifest themselves; and how an architectural language can represent the ideals and values of the defined organisation within a particular culture.

"Norrish's project called 'The Seven Vails of The Lord' examines institutional religion's subordination of women through hierarchy, ritual, and spatial exclusion.

"The project deconstructs the faith's given axioms through a series of narrative spatial sequences overlaid with subverted historical and contemporary church rituals."

Student: Cassie Norrish Course: BA(Hons) Architecture Tutor: Keith Andrews

The Colony by Sam Pick

"This studio explored plans. It considered how they are created and what implications this method has on their realisation as spaces.

"Students developed unique approaches to plans as counter positions to rational 2D methods. Projects were set in Greenwich, with students given free control over briefs and programmes to explore their approaches.

"This project proposes that colonising another planet is the only response to the increasing danger of climate change. The 'colony' uses 3D-printing methods to explore spatial limitations and consider how the inhabitants might cope with being in control of their own environment.

"The spatial consequences of 3D printing are explored alongside a politically charged narrative over time, with the colony inhabitants coming together and pulling apart as they modify their surroundings."

Student: Sam Pick Course: BA(Hons) Architecture Tutor: Tom Vigar

Breaking the Mould: Pottery Workshops for Autistic and Non-verbal Individuals by Hannah Elebert

"Through art-based studio practice and self-generated projects, our interior architecture and design graduating students create sustainable interior spaces, engaging with the adaptive reuse of buildings and structures in response to contemporary social, ethical and political issues.

"Elebert's project advocates for environmental inclusion through creating an interactive space designed to accommodate the needs of autistic and non-verbal individuals.

"Located in the Former Calcining Works, a Grade II Listed Building in Stoke-on-Trent, the project extends the legacy of the site including learning spaces and pottery workshops for the manipulation of clay.

"Focus is given to the detailing of transition spaces that address the specific accessibility needs of autistic and non-verbal children."

Student: Hannah Elebert Course: BA(Hons) Interior Architecture and Design Tutors: Maryam Osman and Amanda Wanner

Leeds Innovation District by Magdalena Maciejewska

"This studio was designed to create opportunities for students to demonstrate creativity, personal focus and design competence through undertaking a comprehensive landscape architecture challenge in Leeds Innovation District.

"Together with Leeds universities and the teaching hospitals NHS Trust, the city have embarked on creating a focal point for innovation in the city.

"Alongside development opportunities, they are encouraging collaboration between universities, health professionals and civic leaders to enable business and job creation and growth.

"This project is a landscape proposition at the heart of the proposed district, including sculptures built with solar panels and corten steel that will power street lighting and water features."

Student: Magdalena Maciejewska Course: BA(Hons) Landscape Architecture and Design Tutors: Alia Fadel and Mohammad Taleghani

Kirkstall Forge Sponge Park by Nisha Hawkridge

"The design of Kirkstall Forge Sponge Park on the River Aire in Leeds is driven by natural interventions. It creates a resilient landscape that responds to the impacts of flooding and climate change now and in the future.

"The park will support the river by protecting the surrounding settlements and filtering water runoff before it reaches the river; provide wildlife with biodiverse habitats along with clean river water which will promote aquatic life; and bring people together with both flooding and wildlife through natural strategies

"Kirkstall Forge Sponge Park will embrace flooding and proposes natural features that work with increased rainfall and not against it."

Student: Nisha Hawkridge Course: Master of Landscape Architecture Tutors: John Maccleary and Chris Royffe

Skeletons, Skins and Parallaxes: Laboratories of Politics and Kinetic Inhabitation by Amy Ferguson

"The Cinematic Commons studio seeks to depart from the current challenging situation – isolation protocols, domestic implosion and disabled public realms – to probe alternative possibilities of spatial conditions to resist the control, disconnection and dissolution of urban public spaces.

"While the connection of homes and streets in terms of political demonstrations has in recent decade been altered due to the capabilities of instant and mobile documentation, this recent period of COVID-19 lockdown further magnified the desire towards the combination of remote and in-situ political movements – the era of 'armchair activism.'

"This project aims to recognise the potential of linking a locally immersive and adaptive environment of work and occupancy with globalised political campaigns on worldwide environmental and ecological issues.

"Thus, the project creates 'laboratories of politics' equipped with architecturally kinetic mechanisms of 'skeletons, skins and parallaxes', drawing inspiration from the adaptability of film and theatre production sets and multi-locational virtual reality relaying technologies for future inhabitants.

"The project probes a series of protest architecture for activists and a hub of 'politics-as-lived' for the like-minded to research, campaign and form communities of affinities.

"The adaptability of the architectural, kinetic mechanism activates the protest territories, occupying and transforming spaces within the street, on structures and within buildings.

"Many parts of the architectural, kinetic system can be re-distributed in the protest territory and also move to remote locations yet keeping a synchronic relation with the base labs. The parallax of space across time extends to a parallax of multiple situations and modes of activisms."

Student: Amy Ferguson Course: Master in Architecture (MArch) Tutor: Doreen Bernath

A Post Pandemic Pocket Book to Re-connect a Faceless Society by Grace Butcher

"The ‘Post Pandemic Story Book’ takes the opportunity to reconnect society through participatory design. The project focuses on 'care' to explore modes of inhabitation for a multi-generational population, providing user-modified spatial layouts connected by generous garden spaces that allow for escape or chance meeting.

"The Liverpool North Docks site is restructured through a series of engineered timber frameworks which are then populated by a set of conditions and increasingly finer material systems that negotiate from the strategic to human scale. The architectural outcome is driven by user appropriation and demand for open-ended programmes of occupation, offering creative capabilities for an uncertain future."

Student: Grace Butcher Course: Master in Architecture (MArch) Tutor: Nick Tyson

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and Leeds Beckett University. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

The post Leeds Beckett University presents nine architecture and design projects appeared first on Dezeen.

#Architecture – Dezeen

0 notes

architectuul · 4 years

Text

FOMA 41: In Search Of Theatrical Halls

Lemonot, a tandem that meets between architecture and performative arts to trigger and celebrate the spontaneous theatre of everyday life, is presenting five Forgotten Masterpieces that shaped their modus operandi.

Five architectures seem at first glance completely disconnected, they are located in five different cities, designed by different architects, with different programs in diverse historical times. Yet they’re all united by the presence of prominent public interiors with a strong emphasis on the use of unique spatial languages, that make them great examples to investigate how to stage alternative forms of theatricality beyond specific theatre architecture.

In his “Texts on Theatre” describes Jacques Copeau how architecture doesn’t simply contain the drama but produces it, by co-creating its meanings, conventions and aesthetics. Staging a performance, Copeau continues, “is about acting in architecture: it is a practice that demands we pay attention to distance, scale, style, person-to-volume ratio and the immaterial architectures of light, heat and sound. Furthermore, using performativity as a design tool outside the boundaries of fictional scenographies leads to real yet unconventional spatial experiences.”

Indeed, the uncanny linguistic features of these buildings, in terms of geometry, colors, materiality or the clash between architectural layout and designated purpose, affect the way people inhabit them, enabling a peculiar acting in space as the performing of collective rituals and daily routines.

The Solimene Factory was born from the friendship of Vincenzo Solimene, called “Il Vasaio” (the Pottery Maker) and Paolo Soleri, who in 1950 traveled to Italy with the purpose to learn the art of pottery. Solimene entrusted him with the first and only project carried out in Europe, allowing him to design the factory for the production of ceramics.

Circular bases of round terra-cotta vases are embedded in the concrete cladding and decorate the facade. | Photo © Luca Bullaro

The building is as if carved into the rocks overlooking the sea, incorporating the objects it produces. From the outside a bright enamels mosaic in the form of a drapery, almost as a garment giving a hint of what is produced inside, constructed with sixteen thousand waste vases, glazed in copper green or in simple terra-cotta embedded into the facade.

If the outside is wavy and sinuous like the Amalfi domes, the inside is geometric and defines the space towards the center. This fifteen meters central skylight illuminates the objects that are produced every day by expert hands. The interior, flared upwards, follows the same archaic principle of the object that is produced: the growth of the vase on the lathe. The ramp going through the floors, defines the four stages of ceramic processing and allows us to better observe the thousands of coloured and painted dishes, cups and vases.

The pieces are fired at the top floors and slowly come down to be painted in the main atrium, as you descend into the building you see this chromatic and also geometric change - from the material to its final creation. The building accompanies you throughout the production of a single object - starting with the terracotta and gradually seeing its final shape and colours. The objects become part of this scenography, framed in every gaze. They’re simultaneously actors and props that drive the public - constraining you to squeeze and linger among them. It is an architecture that screams the craft made with hands, which is still in full fervor today.

The Scala Theatre in Bangkok was without doubt the grand old theater and the finest movie theater left in Southeast Asia. Named after the Teatro della Scala in Milan, it first opened in 1969, showing the American civil war movie “The Undefeated”. Unfortunately, it has been recently closed down, probably due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and changing consumer preferences.

Its wonder is certainly due to the central location in Bangkok, one of the most chaotic cities in the world. The most interesting part of the building is not the enclosed screening hall. Rather, it’s the covered yet open foyer, whose elegant and geometric interiors are constantly and directly contrasted by the noise of the mopeds, by the smell of street food grills and tropical plants that can be seen from the windows. Its relationship with the city is definitely theatrical.

In the past these kinds of theaters were usually situated in city centers and markets, where they became community gathering points as they supported the theater and the community. In this line, the foyer of Scala theatre acts as a proper public space, as a shaded portico that offers shelter from the heat of Bangkok. This is reflected in its overwhelming but at the same time welcoming decorations - columns that drop from the ceiling, lights in the shape of geometric flowers, floors and walls covered with velvet fabric. Thai culture is eccentric, it is flamboyant and greets you by dominating your senses.

The architecturally significant cinema’s Art Deco stylings and interiors were designed by Jira Silpkanok, which with its velvet curtains, veteran ushers, and vast auditorium, evoked the golden age of film exhibition. Specifically, the foyer consists of a huge domed ceiling, set up with bronzed art deco flowers. You are conquered by the vaulted windows that frame Bangkok as a choreographed spectacle - by the different types of textures both on the base of the columns outlining the shadows. Two stairways converge at the top taking you to the second floor, while almost touching the long chandelier that illuminates the center. A visionary architecture, where as soon as you enter it seems to be in a ship, or a spaceship.

The Bellini Theater in Palermo was first called Teatro Travaglino, from the name of a Sicilian burlesque mask. A hidden truth is hidden in its name since the theater has had to change many faces throughout the centuries. Destroyed several times by earthquakes and wars and many times rebuilt and renamed, looking for a new identity. What we have today is an incomparable Architectural stratigraphy of historical facts.

The theatre was an open living room in between privately owned palaces where the public could go in for the first time. | Photo © Lemonot

The theater has been literally carved inside a noble dwelling, the gallery and the stage are built between private houses, in fact it is still possible to see the windows of the neighbors that overlooked the main stage. It was entertaining popular operas and due to this fact, the space was constructed around a small stage with few wooden benches. Initially the main gallery had only festive purposes, banquets were set up and dances were often opened; it is only later that great artists were presented and therefore had a primarily cultural purpose.

Over time Marquises of Santa Lucia sacrificed part of their palace to build in 1726 a classic Italian-style theater with 4 tiers of boxes and entirely in decorated wood, it was called the theater of St. Lucia. The need for a more refined theater for the Elitè was entrusted to the royal architect Nicolò Puglia who accommodated more than 500 spectators.

Due to the disastrous earthquake that struck Palermo in 1726, the theater remained closed for several years, reopened only in 1742, enlarged and restored again, incorporating some neighboring houses of the Marquis Bellaroto.

In 1943 during the second world war it was also requisitioned by the US military and used as a movie theater for soldiers. In 1964 the building was damaged by a fire and subsequently recovered thanks to the intervention of the Teatro Biondo Stabile in Palermo and thanks to the professionalism of its director Claudio Grasso who regained the license from the Palermo police headquarters and returned the theater to its original function in 1980 until 2014.

Since 2019 is hosting a mixed-media installation designed by Alfredo Jarr. This operation led to many controversies - since part of Palermo’s cultural community stated that a theatre should be open only for spectacles and actual plays. The theatre layout and the museographic stage set affect and update each other in a very interesting way: the usual relationship between the proscenium (the place for the spectacle) and the platea (the place for the audience) is inverted, since the public gathers to admire the exhibition from the first, while the artworks are hosted in the latter, emptied of chairs’ rows.

Furthermore, this peculiar theatrical framework, shifting the way we look at the artifacts, activates a spontaneous layer of performativity, otherwise left behind in most traditional museum environments.

The Cistern Chapel or the Sewage Cathedral is a former pumping station designed by chief engineer Sir Joseph Bazalgette and architect Charles Henry Driver. Its construction became necessary in response to the the Great Stink of 1858.

The meticulous designs and bright colors have made the Crossness Pumping Station a real Victorian-style gem. | Photo © Lemonot

Its construction became necessary when the Thames became particularly polluted enough to raise a putrid smell throughout the city. The situation was aggravated by the unusually hot climate that hit the English capital and made the stench even stronger and unpleasant. To solve the problem, the Bazalgette plan consisted in the construction of two sewers to be placed in the outermost areas of the city. One of these was the Crossness Pumping Station which, at the time, had the function of draining the putrid waters to the east by running clean water into the Thames.

The complex is covered with decorations surrounded by cast ironworks forming columns rising up from the ground floor. | Photo © Lemonot

An architecture is made of joints and unconscious paths following geometric shapes and colored corners. The light is drawn to the central octagonal arcade, which supports a frieze of regimented yet twisting leaves and tendrils and on each column flowers, leafs and fruits decorate the capitals. At the time, the highly crafts fancy curlicues of cast iron weren’t seen as an unnecessary expense - it was the first time for such functional purpose to build with opulent and organic decoration of this kind.

Indeed, there is a great sacral charge within the main octagonal space that encourages the people to gather between the columns, inviting you to look up but also to hide among the industrial spaces - that become almost domestic. All four engines were named after members of the royal family; Victoria, Albert Edward and Alexandra: for this reason the choice of colors, materials and different patterns follows a specific narrative, becoming a built embodiment of their personalities. The spatial elements are actually personified, transformed into architectural characters.

Sprawled over a high plateau above La Paz, El Alto is arguably Latin America’s largest indigenous city. At an altitude of 4800 m, colorful buildings arise and geometric facades are visible from the teleferico travelling above the altiplano. The first cholets, also called New Andean architectures, were sighted almost fifteen years ago by Freddy Mamani Silvestre. Since then, they proliferated: various architects have appropriated them in terms of style and copied them typologically.

Cholet is a portmanteau of the high-class chalet - the pitched roofs of these mansions resemble the ones of Swiss cottages and the derogatory cholo, a racist slang for an indigenous person. Mamani ‘s buildings have a common language, two or three storey and a ballroom on the highest ceiling room filled with Andean symbols, casted columns and windows with different geometrical profiles cutting the whole space. Using the colors of textiles are tracing inspiration from traditional garments and folkloric masks. These ballrooms are identified not only through iconographies but also by the use they make of it - from dances to ceremonies, to domestic inhabitation, to basketball courts or swimming pools.

Cholets are always designed in close contact with the buyer, triggering a personal and almost process of embodiment of the owner with the building itself. The building is to produce income. On the roof is our own home. The spatial experience can be read in completely opposite way, during the day the light from outside is absorbed by the colors and it seems to be in a video game, a confetti space. As soon as darkness falls, the LED lights direct you into the ballroom and surround every architectural element.

Not only the architecture itself is ornamental but the eccentricity with which the Aymara use and change the program of the space. The one of cholets is a controversial phenomenon, that nonetheless portrays the political, social and economic contemporaneity in Bolivia. On an urban level the cholets have become a symbol, recognizable monuments - able to immediately recall Andean identity nationally and internationally. Ultimately, the architecture of Crucero del Sur speaks the same language of the ceremonies that take place inside it. In these exuberant interiors, matter and performance achieved an absolute reciprocity.

—

#FOMA 41: Sabrina Morreale and Lorenzo Perri

Sabrina Morreale and Lorenzo Perri are architects, educators and co-founders of Lemonot, a design and research platform based in London. Hungry observers and compulsive collectors of anthropic mirabilia, they’re interested in all those iconographic gestures that enable the mutual immanence among objects, bodies and rituals. Their academic research focuses on contemporary folklore as a trigger for unconventional spatial languages, between geometrical abstraction and material figurativism. They’re Programme Heads of the AA Visiting school El Alto and currently teach at the Architectural Association and the University of Applied Arts Vienna.

#foma #forgotten masterpieces

2 notes · View notes

ephillipsresearch · 3 years

Video

youtube

BLOC PROJETCS HARSH LIGHT- NOTES The concluding webinar of our December installment will welcome artists Verity Birt and Una Hamilton, and researcher Dr Edwin Coomasaru in conversation. Variously working on gender, British identity, folklore and the occult, the speakers will be reflecting on the “E” of ACE—Arts Council England—and that which constitutes “Englishness”. The conversation will self-reflexively think through these English textures and their adoption in sub cultural contexts, including white supremacist narratives of “blood and soil” nativism, as well as feminist and black metal re-inscriptions of a more ecologically entangled landscape.

Question – how the occult has shaped their respective ideas of myth landscape and English identity

Verity Birt - reading ridley walker- inspiration, novel written by russel hoborn, imagining post apocalyptic future in the dark ages, written in phonetic language, returning to an oral history- did a residency in Newcastle with newbridge project, running experimental workshops at prehistoric sites with a community choir – thinking about how features of the landscape impact improvisation – what can happen when you allow for more imaginative and experimental exchange with these sites installation at black tower projects mapped through memory, dream space, tracing the contour lines of the space, exploring the notion of giving/receiving from the landscape - ceramic offerings – recreated the channel in ceramic, vaginal shape references strong feminine energy- workshop not directly documented. – choreographed performances in space in the summer equinox 2019 performance looking at deep time/ fragments of lineages, evolution, how they are continued and transmitted, questioning enlightenment, theory of time as progress – battersea pleasure gardens – live improvised performance to text piece a mash of feminist theory, myth, fiction, archeology uncommon ground – attempt to confront dark side of mythology within the English psyche – white horse stone kent- during research came across white supremacist group that used to guard the site- 2 chanel video – follows icon of the white horse and its relation to alt white narratives and history in mythology – also included fragments of conversions with ethan d white about alt right pagan rituals and beliefs at these sites – anglo saxon mythology Una Hamilton helle - 2009/10 – makes work in landscape, place, nature and how we encode them with our own theories and experiences – the lay archive, ‘after math’ or ‘trauma’ photography- events can linger on in places and can you capture this through camera, looking at political troubles in Ireland. Attempt to explore what could be captured on camera, lay lines connecting places of worship etc, energy lines, ufo sightings, can you capture any of this in images? Short film the return from Annwn, 2015, inspired by sci-fi and the English landscape. Sacred sites, mound burials, paces of energy, becoming the forest- long term art project interrogating sense of belonging what is heritage, connecting with the landscape - looked to black metal genre that uses landscapes/ Nordic aesthetics – looking at how topography and environments influence people – short stories about black metalists worshipping spruce trees - zine , becoming the forest to explore those ideas more critically, - commissioned essays about the topic from different political, cultural and scientific perspectives commissioned by waltham and epping forest to do installation that looked at epping forest as the peoples forest, and how human narratives have shaped the forest – workshops, performance

Dr Edwin coomasaru Complicated relationship to concept of Englishness 2018 – research driven by questions of ‘why has occult imagery become so importanct for feminist art and activism? What might this renewed interest in the supernatural from across the political spectrum tell us about the current crisis of British identity, shaped by colonial narratives, enlightened Europeans spreading rational modernity while committing oppression murder and theft 18/19 – courtold project on politics of gender and race in brexit visual culture – interested in the way artists responded to issue of irish border in eu negotiations – rita duffy collabed with women of both sides of irish border to create installation that straddled the border – knitted votive figures on the black line bridge – image above from derry 10 exhibition Kerry powell Williams on tarot, held supernatural performance on walker plinth, looked at history of somerset house – building once hq for royal navy and hmrc, all implicated in histories of empire increased interest in supernaturalism a response to corporate wellness culture, welfare state cutbacks and precarious employment – as feminist and anti racist activism surged in 2010, so did far right extremist, brexit articulated and exacerbate crisis of British identity, colonial/rational/modern narratives against those considered supernatural, other or primitive, created conceptual binary between magic and science 1876,eng traveler William h Dixon –‘ if we wish to see order and freedom , science and civilization preserved, we should give first thought to what improves the white mans growth and increase the white man’s strength - gina rippons gendered brain – challenged idea that science was ever neutral or objective, it s all implicated with power and projection feminist and anti racist artists are turning to the occult to reclaim/ challenge the myths that underpin patriarchal white supremacy

How do materials beings and sites become co-opted into story and myth? what stories and myths can artists today extract from the land that will forge a path for post Brexit Britain that is inclusive healing and open and how does this approach include a celebration of Englishness.

VB -Turned to the supernatural and tarot as a way of generating hope in a very hopeless situation- the 2008 recession – allows for mystery, imagination and nuance – using tarot to guide the work, relinquish control – don’t see it as a supernatural things, it’s a way of connecting with natural forces, seeing it in a post modern, materialist light

UH – mysticism as opposition to the narratives the nation tells themselves – also retaining a sense of imagination, not buying into protestant work ethic – productivity is everything – found this is in occult theories – trying to understand what we are actually listening to in occult stories and myths- who’s histories are these? DC- family interested in se Asian forms of spirituality , became interested aspects of activist that used the occult as an insult and those that were interested din magic – bbc article ‘brexit leads to resurgence in tarot’ intense uncertainty about the future and finding ways to narrate a story to the self – there is nobody NOT engaging in magical thinking – storytelling and the ability of narratives to conceptually present the world to us in different ways Vb storytelling – critical awareness of the falsehood of truths, hierarchy of belief and value we assign to certain myths over other revisiting feminist myth making trajectory – how it has shifted between waves, changing ideas of gender, how gender and myth are intertwined, etc how myths have sedimented in the body – whiteness embodiment - how can we excavate that? Romanticism of neo paganism – grey areas between liberal left and alt white spaces

Englishness, an important part of brexit is the tensions between Englishness and brutishness – England drove the vote but Wales also voted leave

VB- looking for line of flight from Englishness- stuck with facing own white Englishness – (not proud of heritage?) coming from rural working class land based peasantry – most family were brexiteers, ideas of people living in different worlds – respective the world view but navigating conversations of black lives matter. Huge disconnect between rural and urban landscape – trying to reconfigure clashes in own identity rural/urban recent work ‘crossings’ about encountering rural landscape after being urbanized

UH– myth of the nation state – disconnect with place? Disenfranchisement – enclosures, uprooting, urbanization, industries disappears – possibilities for community eroded at every corner for a hundred years – what does place/ local place mean? Nobody has that deep rooted relationship with the land anymore?

DC – anxiety about living off the land – spells about butter,- sense of powerlessness and feeling out of control -the occult has very specific histories and its consciously appropriated

mass displacement in the industrial revolution -

are myths just replaced with others? Everything is myth – there is no objective reality

VB – counter myth making, everything is myth, these are imaginative worlds, capitalism is a shared belief – counter myths – opens up new potentials

the enlightenment was created to enable imperialism and capitalism - how can we generate new worlds that cater to non-conforming folk –modern myths have been generate to support the cis white able man

#bookmark

0 notes