View source for * Ann Maria Healy (Ireland)


Synopsis of Reclaiming Animism by Isabelle Stenger

Isabelle Stengers begins her essay on reclaiming animism by conceptualizing bridges and divides. Placing herself firmly on the non-believer side of that divide, she moves on to discuss the decolonization of thought in relation to the hierarchy of science, comparing the hierarchy of science to a tree trunk in relation to Deluze’s rhizome. In thinking about the social milieu she reflects that everything is related and cannot act independently of each other, drawing many comparisons between objective; subjective, natural; supernatural, hierarchy and the milieu she maps the degradation of belief in contemporary society.
Infected by our own objectivity she urges us to transform through reclaiming words such as ‘magic’ and ‘animism’ through reclamation of the poisoned milieu. She explores the idea that science and writing, actions that can be seen as acts of objectivity, can also function as acts of transformation and urges us to question our aversion to mystification. In thinking about witchcraft she ponders how it could be possible to be ‘compromised by magic’ and explore ‘change as a creation’ By the end of the text, Stengers herself has gone through a transformation, acting as a bridge maker as she does in her own career. She maps the road from non-belief to belief and back again to somewhere in the center ground of that rhizome where perhaps our milieus ‘compulsion to categorize and judge’ can begin to be eroded.


Parapraxis

It’s a freestanding screen, leaned up against a concrete block, wider in width than it is in height. There’s a projection of a figure on the screen, roughly one third of the height of the viewer. The image is over exposed and the figure is partially covered by a bright yellow Selfridges bag. The figure stands in the pose that Tyra Banks uses to promote America’s next top model, it is held for the course of an hour. Glitches begin to occur in the video, the figure begins to dance the choreography from Beyoncé’s, ‘Run the World’ It’s danced in the same position by the same figure but it’s cut into the first shot of the figure holding the pose. Initially the choreography appears as glitches but as time passes the cuts lengthen and more of the choreography is visible. The video is looped; no beginning or end is visible.

Pink Haze

It's a looped video on a monitor at eye level. Flowers; darkened tulips, move back and fourth rhythmically. There is flesh also, the shot is close up so the entirety of the form cannot be seen. Pink bars; the shot is shaky and blurry, moving in and out of focus also close up so that the entirety of the form cannot be seen. Bog; seen from the ground, a hand enters the shot then enters the ground. Two hands dig and pull at the earth. Blurry pink bars come back into focus and hands dig deeper. Rhythmical flowers are being shoved to and fro into the camera by the flesh. Harsher more frantic movements prevail, shot from above; the hands are digging into solid ground to produce a rhythmical pounding of the earth.

I do not feel ashamed

A rectangular length of cream material is spread out on the floor. There is a conical pile of wheat on the material. Two stones rest near the wheat, one smaller than the other. A female figure wearing an orange dress kneels on the material next to the wheat and stones. She grinds the stones together whilst singing the 1990's pop song ‘bitch’ by Meredith Brooks.  She never grinds the wheat just the stones. At stages she pulls the wheat behind her and balances from the material. She lies on the floor with the stone resting on her chest, singing. At intervals she sings, she breaks the song down, changing the rhythm and the structure of the song, she speaks it, and then whispers it.  The performance lasts for eight hours.