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Animism

excerpt
Preface
(p. 9)


How does the conceptual distinction between “nature” and “culture,” so typical of modernity, inform the perception of limits in artistic practice and visual culture? Animism interrogates two key processes in aesthetics— animation and conservation, movement and stasis—against the backdrop of the anthropological term “animism” and its historical implications. For what is mere fiction in modern aesthetics, for so-called “animist practices” is actual relations. What is commonly referred to as the most “fictional” of imaginary productions—the animated universes of film, the effect of the “life-like” in artistic objects and images, the creation of fantastic worlds in which objects are alive and things can speak—then assumes a sudden “documentary” value, by way of which the question of “relationality,” which also played a significant role in recent art history, can assume a new qualitative dimension.

This project had begun to take shape in Antwerp in 2006. The ongoing discussions were extended to Bern, Vienna, and Berlin, places where subsequent versions of the exhibition will be hosted in the course of the next few years—one building upon the other. It is the result of a collaborative effort between artists, writers, curators, and institutions. It was shaped through other projects, exhibitions, and collaborations, and many have given us the opportunity to further discuss the issues at stake in artistic and academic contexts during the process of the development. We wish to thank all of those for the imprint they left on the project.

The present publication accompanies the exhibition in Antwerp and Bern. The publication does not document the exhibition, but rather translates it into the medium of a book. It seeks to lay a foundation from which further questions can be asked. It shifts between different registers and vocabularies, mainly, aesthetics and anthropology. The vast majority of the contributions have been conceived in response to the project, complemented by first-time translations of relevant texts.


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