Imagining alternatives: gazing at the contemporary world through figurations of the outmoded

Abstract

This thesis explains the reasoning behind the convergence of two cases of the outmoded in my art practice. The two instances of obsolescence are old fashioned, pre-cinematic optical devices and the social model of the counterculture commune. My thesis investigates the theoretical, socio-cultural and formal issues associated with my interest in these outmoded phenomena. It will also examine the role of obsolete technologies and ways of living in other contemporary art, asking whether the rekindling of anachronistic forms possess critical agency in the present.

Detailed analysis of the twin foci of my research will elaborate how and why I incorporate and reconfigure outmoded forms in my art practice, and through this contribute new knowledge to the contemporary art field. I argue that the outmoded forms given new life in my art hark back to times in the past when it seemed easier to imagine a space and a thinking outside the dominant socio-economic system of modern Western culture; when faith in inventing alternative visions of the world via utopian imagination seemed more vital.

My studio-based and written research draws on theoretical resources allied with the tradition of Marxist critical theory, which locate socially critical potential within phenomena considered obsolete within the context of capitalism. The key early proponent of this way of thinking is Walter Benjamin who figures prominently in my research project. My project also builds on the findings of contemporary theorists of Neo-Marxist persuasion who address the social, subjective and ecological shortcomings of the current phase of global capitalism. These thinkers include Fredric Jameson, Slavoj Źi ek, Felix Guattari and Franco Bifo Berardi among others.

Regardless of the current challenges to imagining alternatives to prevailing modes of capitalist production and consumption, my project sets out a politics of the outmoded, which seeks inspiration in technical and social experiments of the past, which, while relegated to the dustbin of history by the techno-teleological drive of capitalism, offer glimmers of hope for alternative futures.