
Cosmic Pessimism
Eugene Thacker
A performed lecture concerned with Renaissance occult (musical) thinkers of the cosmic who put forward the notion of the “disharmony of the world”
Arika have been creating events since 2001. The Archive is space to share the documentation of our work, over 600 events from the past 20 years. Browse the archive by event, artists and collections, explore using theme pairs, or use the index for a comprehensive overview.
A performed lecture concerned with Renaissance occult (musical) thinkers of the cosmic who put forward the notion of the “disharmony of the world”
A celebration of risk taking and adventure from some of the boldest pioneers of the past 40 years, melding avant garde and underground forms of music and moving image to create new experiments and experiences in sight and sound.
Discussion: If we approach “care as an event” rather than as a “contract of exchange” then what becomes possible in how we know, care for, and appreciate each other?
Underlying radical transfeminism, as an urgent critique of binary essentialism and fixed identities, is the call for a new kind of thinking that can move between and integrate the truths of all lives in their transformations.
Three short performances involving social exchange (jumpers, hats, glasses…) and singing (ballads)
Ever changing coven of feedback worshipping witches led by Blood Stereo/ Smack Music 7 shrieker Karen Constance spit audio hexes through yr skulls.
Three documentary films exploring diverse realities of sex workers around the world followed by a closing ceremony of the festival.
What’s the relationship between the eternal hum of the oceanic beloved and the persistence of vorticity in fluid dynamics? And how does Alice Coltrane’s harp help us stay there?
Inspired by Delany’s Aye, and Gomorra. A spookily filmic world where asexual bodies live in the contradiction of their unarousable loneliness and desire for intimacy and contact.
A parody of a (Manhattan) road movie and meditation on bifurcation, in paths traveled between the seen and the heard; a road trip played over and over from different perspectives.
An extravagant debauch of plush toys and ritual. Palestine performed a version of Strumming Music, a trance inducing investigation into overtone systems achievable on a Bosendorfer Imperial Piano.
We asked Christoph to come and give a sort of informal talk, raising some of his ideas about sound and image, and playing/ showing a few examples.