E-flux Podcast

Artist Karl Holmqvist reads “ANOTHER WAR IS POSSIBLE” and “NUMBERS,” and speaks with artist and e-flux founder Anton Vidokle. Karl Holmqvist is known for using a wide range of formats—poetry readings, installation, and sculpture–to bring out the primal qualities of language. He is one of a current generation of artists working with language and text as sculptural or performative material. Holmqvist says his work is meant to spark the creative process in the viewer, seeing his art and poetry as a translation of the complexities of contemporary life. He blends poetry with pop music and his texts, composed of anecdotes as famous as they are diverse, explore the themes of communication and language. Together, the works unpack the many operations of language, how it can occupy space and provoke “invisible images” within memory and imagination. In February 2019, e-flux’s Bar Laika presented a new work by Karl Holmqvist: #FLU$$CH (29 minutes, 2017), with an introduction by and Q&A with Pati Hertling. You can rea

e-flux journal editor Brian Kuan Wood speaks to Kader Attia, artist and founder of La Colonie, a space in Paris for sharing ideas and discussion. Focussing on decolonialisation not only of people but also of knowledge, attitudes and practices, it aspires to de-compartmentalise knowledge by a trans-cultural, trans-disciplinary and trans-generational approach. Driven by the urgency of social and cultural reparations, it aims to reunite which has been shattered, or drift apart. Kader Attia (b. 1970, France), grew up in Paris and in Algeria. Preceding his studies at the École Supérieure des Arts Appliqués Duperré and the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, and at Escola Massana, Centre d’Art i Disseny in Barcelona, he spent several years in Congo and in South America. The experience with these different cultures, the histories of which over centuries have been characterised by rich trading traditions, colonialism and multi-ethnic societies, has fostered Kader Attia’s intercultural and interdi

Following a recently published text in e-flux journal issue 98 (March 2019), Tyler Coburn joins Contributing Editor Elvia Wilk to discuss the project Ergonomic Futures. Coburn's Ergonomic Futures asks questions about contemporary “fitness” through the lens of speculative evolution. The multi-part project includes furniture designed with Bureau V and a website of stories designed with Luke Gould and Afonso Martins. Tyler Coburn is an artist and writer based in New York. His most recent book, Richard Roe, was published by Sternberg Press in March 2019. –Watch a performance delivered at e-flux in 2016 as part of Ergonomic Futures on e-flux Video & Film.  –Read "Ergonomic Futures," published in e-flux journal issue 98 (March 2019).

Sanna Almajedi and Andreas Petrossiants speak with Lucie Vítková following her Satellite music series performance at Bar Laika. Lucie Vítková is a composer, improviser, and performer (accordion, hichiriki, synthesizer, voice, and tap dance) from the Czech Republic. She recently organized a performance with OPERA Ensemble on climate change. For Satellite, Vítková performed two pieces, one from “Music Domestic,” and another from her “Post-Apocalyptic” series. In 2017 Vítková was nominated to the Herb Alpert Awards in Arts in the category of Music, and was a resident artist at Roulette in 2018. She has put together two ensembles—the NYC Constellation Ensemble (focused on music behavior) and the OPERA Ensemble (for singing instrumentalists). During her 2017 Mentor/Protégé Residency in Tokyo, she studied hichiriki with Hitomi Nakamura and has been a member of the Columbia University Gagaku Ensemble. As an accordion player, she collaborated with the New York-based TAK Ensemble, S.E.M. ensemble, String Noise, Du.0,

Tony Wood and Brian Kuan Wood discuss “Intrusions: Or, The Golden Age Is Not in Us” published in e-flux journal #98, March 2019. The text examines three science-fiction scenarios that for Tony illustrate three collapses of orders of magnitude or scale—Samuel R. Delany’s Dhalgren, written in the US in the 1970s; Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker, filmed in the USSR in the same decade; and Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy, published in the US in the 2010s. Tony Wood lives in New York and writes about Latin America and Russia. He is the author of Russia without Putin: Money, Power and the Myths of the New Cold War (2018), and is currently working on a PhD about the Latin American radical left in the 1920s and 1930s.

Sanna Almajedi speaks with C. Spencer Yeh following his Satellite music series performance at Bar Laika.  C. Spencer Yeh is recognized for his interdisciplinary activities and collaborations as an artist, improviser, and composer, as well his music project Burning Star Core. Originally conceived in 1993 in Cincinnati, the project was known for its unique blend of musique concrète, ambient, drone, and psychedelic music. His recent solo albums Solo Voice I-X (2015) and The RCA Mark II (2018) were published by Primary Information. His video works are distributed by Electronic Arts Intermix. Recent exhibitions and presentations of his work include Shocking Asia at Empty Gallery, Hong Kong; Two Workaround Works Around Calder at the Whitney Museum, New York; Modern Mondays at MoMA, New York; and Tony Conrad Tribute at Atelier Nord/Ultima Festival, Oslo.    Satellite is a monthly experimental music series organized by Sanna Almajedi at Bar Laika by e-flux. Music clips in order heard: (1) C. Spencer Yeh, "SOLO VOICE

Sanna Almajedi speaks with Keith Fullerton Whitman following his Satellite music series performance at Bar Laika.  A composer and performer living in Brooklyn, Keith Fullerton Whitman is currently in the process of realizing geographically and thematically relevant live electronic music under the “Redactions” banner, as well as performing contemporary revisions of his classic “Generators” and “Playthroughs” frameworks. He recently performed at the GRM's Immersion festival in Paris, Documenta 14 in Athens, The Labyrinth in Niigata, MaerzMusik's The Long Now in Berlin, Semibreve in Braga, Send + Receive in Winnipeg, The Geometry of Now in Moscow, and the Don Buchla Memorial Concerts in San Francisco. Satellite is a monthly experimental music series organized by Sanna Almajedi at Bar Laika by e-flux.

Artist Agnieszka Kurant and researcher Tobias Rees in conversation with e-flux journal Contributing Editor Elvia Wilk.   Agnieszka Kurant explores how complex social, economic and ecological systems can operate in ways that confuse distinctions between fiction and reality or nature and culture. Probing collective intelligence, surveillance capitalism, AI and the evolution of culture, labor and creativity, she investigates automation, crowdsourcing and data exploitation in the context of art production. Her works often behave like living organisms, self-organized complex systems or bachelor machines. Her past projects include a commission for the façade of the Guggenheim Museum (2015) and a solo exhibition at the Sculpture Center, New York (2013). In 2010 she co-represented Poland at the Venice Biennale of Architecture. Her work was featured in exhibitions at Palais de Tokyo, Guggenheim Bilbao, Tate Modern, Witte de With, Moderna Museet, MUMOK, Bonner Kunstverein, The Kitchen, Frieze Projects and Performa Bien

Artist Agnieszka Kurant and researcher Tobias Rees in conversation with e-flux journal Contributing Editor Elvia Wilk.   Agnieszka Kurant explores how complex social, economic and ecological systems can operate in ways that confuse distinctions between fiction and reality or nature and culture. Probing collective intelligence, surveillance capitalism, AI and the evolution of culture, labor and creativity, she investigates automation, crowdsourcing and data exploitation in the context of art production. Her works often behave like living organisms, self-organized complex systems or bachelor machines. Her past projects include a commission for the façade of the Guggenheim Museum (2015) and a solo exhibition at the Sculpture Center, New York (2013). In 2010 she co-represented Poland at the Venice Biennale of Architecture. Her work was featured in exhibitions at Palais de Tokyo, Guggenheim Bilbao, Tate Modern, Witte de With, Moderna Museet, MUMOK, Bonner Kunstverein, The Kitchen, Frieze Projects and Performa Bien

A conversation with Yesomi Umolu, Diedrich Diederichsen, and Anselm Franke on the occasion of Journeys with the initiated, on view at e-flux and Participant Inc through January 13, 2019. The exhibition features artists Malik Gaines, Evan Ifekoya, Grada Kilomba, Tiona Nekkia McClodden, and Virginia de Medeiros, and is curated by Yesomi Umolu with Katja Rivera. Journeys with the initiated is part of the project Hubert Fichte: Love and Ethnology, initiated by Goethe-Institut and Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Berlin with the support of S. Fischer Stiftung and the S. Fischer Verlag, and led by artistic directors Diedrich Diederichsen and Anselm Franke. The project runs from 2017 to 2019 in collaboration with numerous partners in Lisbon, Salvador de Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, Santiago de Chile, Dakar, and New York, with the final station culminating in Berlin in 2019. Excerpt from Journeys with the initiated: Between 1978 and 1980, queer German novelist, poet, and self-taught ethnographer Hubert Fichte traveled to

e-flux journal editors Julieta Aranda, Brian Kuan Wood, Anton Vidokle, and Kaye Cain-Nielsen discuss 10 years of e-flux journal. Excerpt from the editorial of e-flux journal issue #95—WONDERFLUX: In November 2008, the editorial for issue #00 said: Historically, more than any single institution, art publications have been primary sites for discourse surrounding the artistic field. And yet most recently, the discourse has seemingly moved elsewhere—away from the formal vocabulary used to explain art production, away from traditional art capitals, and away from the printed page. At times, new discursive practices even replace traditional forms of art production. Given the current climate of disciplinary reconfiguration and geographic dispersal, it has become apparent that the urgent task has now become to engage the new intellectual territories in a way that can revitalize the critical vocabulary of contemporary art. We see a fresh approach to the function of an art journal to be perhaps the most productive way

e-flux journal editors Julieta Aranda, Brian Kuan Wood, Anton Vidokle, and Kaye Cain-Nielsen discuss 10 years of e-flux journal. Excerpt from the editorial of e-flux journal issue #95—WONDERFLUX: In November 2008, the editorial for issue #00 said: Historically, more than any single institution, art publications have been primary sites for discourse surrounding the artistic field. And yet most recently, the discourse has seemingly moved elsewhere—away from the formal vocabulary used to explain art production, away from traditional art capitals, and away from the printed page. At times, new discursive practices even replace traditional forms of art production. Given the current climate of disciplinary reconfiguration and geographic dispersal, it has become apparent that the urgent task has now become to engage the new intellectual territories in a way that can revitalize the critical vocabulary of contemporary art. We see a fresh approach to the function of an art journal to be perhaps the most productive way

Recorded after the publication of e-flux journal issue 81 in April 2017, Xin Wang reads and discusses her text “Asian Futurism and the Non-Other” with Stephen Squibb. Xin Wang is a curator and art historian based in New York. She recently participated in e-flux journal’s feminism(s) double issue launch with Martha Rosler, McKenzie Wark, and Elvia Wilk. Past curatorial projects include Lu Yang: Arcade (2014, New York), THE BANK SHOW: Vive le Capital and THE BANK SHOW: Hito Steyerl (2015, Shanghai), chin(A)frica: an interface (2017, New York), and Life and Dreams: Photography and Media Art in China since the 1990s (2018, Ulm, Germany). Wang is currently building a discursive archive of Asian Futurisms at afuturism.tumblr.com, and is a PhD candidate in modern and contemporary art at NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts. Read “Asian Futurism and the Non-Other”: https://www.e-flux.com/journal/81/126662/asian-futurism-and-the-non-other/

In this week's episode of the e-flux podcast, Brian Kuan Wood reads his piece, "The Story of Peter Green Peter Chang," published in February, 2017 as part of e-flux Architecture's Superhumanity project at the 3rd Istanbul Design Biennial. Brian Kuan Wood is a writer and an editor of e-flux journal.

Following a symposium titled Technology is History, in association with the exhibition One Hand Clapping at the Guggenheim, curator Xiaoyu Weng and Brian Kuan Wood join Yuk Hui to discuss his work. The conversation was followed by a talk by Yuk Hui at e-flux titled “What Begins After the End of Enlightenment?” Text mentioned in the conversation: 30 Years after Les Immatériaux - Art, Science and Theory.  Yuk Hui is a philosopher based in Berlin. He is the author of three monographs: On the Existence of Digital Objects (University of Minnesota Press, 2016), The Question Concerning Technology in China: An Essay in Cosmotechnics (Urbanomic, 2016), and Recursivity and Contingency (Rowman and Littlefield International, Spring 2019). Read Yuk Hui in e-flux journal here. Xiaoyu Weng is The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Associate Curator of Chinese Art at the Guggenheim.   Brian Kuan Wood is a founding editor of e-flux journal.

Simone White and Judah Rubin discuss White’s recent text, “or, on being the other woman,” published in e-flux journal issue #92 on feminisms. The conversation followed a recent duo lecture at e-flux with Mirene Arsanios and Simone White. Simone White's most recent book is Dear Angel of Death, published in spring 2018. She lives in Brooklyn and teaches at the University of Pennsylvania. Judah Rubin is a poet living in Queens. He is the former Monday night coordinator at the Poetry Project and is currently working on texts concerning necropolitics, corruption, and all-you-can-eat buffets.

Julieta Aranda and Liam Gillick join Lawrence Weiner in his New York studio for a conversation spanning art education and cosmetic dentistry. Julieta Aranda is an artist and Editor of e-flux journal.  Liam Gillick is an artist living in New York. Read Liam Gillick in e-flux journal. Lawrence Weiner is an artist born in 1942 in New York, NY, where he lives and works today.

Mary Walling Blackburn discusses her text, "Sticky Notes, 1-3," published in e-flux journal #92—"on feminisms" (Summer 2018), with editor-in-chief Kaye Cain-Nielsen. "The video editing suite sat directly across from 1607 Broadway. My mother’s boyfriend was editing a sequence of two figures fighting with long sticks. They were aiming for one another’s heads. Each man, in turn, carefully swung his fragile skull away from a baton, and then a baton toward another fragile skull swinging away. To the right of the screen was a window. From a certain low angle, at a standing vantage point several feet from the sill, the video sequence and a spectacular outside the glass read as an operative split screen." Excerpt from "Sticky Notes, 1-3" *Note from Mary: I should be very clear that when referring to dignity I am speaking about "white dignity"; I am trying to communicate that white dignity is bunk and wealthy dignity is bunk. Moreover, when I state that I don't know why 'anyone gets to keep their things with our statu

Mirene Arsanios discusses her text, "E Autobiography di un Idioma," published in e-flux journal #92—"on feminisms" (Summer 2018). In conversation with editor-in-chief Kaye Cain-Nielsen. "I would have liked to come to you (abo) with something more reliable, like documents (akto), but I’m an oral language (idioma)—an Afro-Portuguese proto-creole developed on the western coast (kosta) of Africa and brought over to the Caribbean in the seventeen century. That’s one of the theories of my genesis. There are others (otronan). Dutch and Spanish tagged along at later stages, with a few Arawak words (palabranan). Initially, slave traders and slaves used me to 'communicate'; then I was just used (merka). The only document in my possession says I was born on the island of Curaçao, north of the Venezuelan shore. Linguists struggle to match my identity to a location. Words travel and land in places (luganan) that do not match their jurisdiction (a nation (nashon)-state)."—Mirene Arsanios, "E Autobiography di un Idioma"   

Eva Díaz discusses her essay "We Are All Aliens" published in e-flux journal issue 91 (May 2018) with contributing editor Elvia Wilk. "For some, contemporary art has become a kind of alt-science platform for research and development projects that offer alternatives to the corporate control and surveillance of outer space. Artists working on issues about access to space are at the front line of a critical investigation about the contours of the future, both in its material form and social organization. Many of these artists are challenging the current expansion of capitalist and colonial practices into outer space, particularly that of so-called 'primitive' accumulation: the taking of land and resources for private use. They recognize that much of the tremendous capital amassed in the early 2000s e-commerce and tech boom is now being funneled into astronomically costly 'New Space' projects such as SpaceX, a company funded by PayPal cofounder Elon Musk, and Blue Origin, the space enterprise of Amazon's Jeff Bez