Hunter Mitchell
@huntermitchell
Hunter Mitchell
‘If, then, something like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is a pathology, it is a pathology of late capitalism—a consequence of being wired into the entertainment-control circuits of hypermediated consumer culture.’
The Society of the Spectacle, Guy Debord
“The real consumer has become a consumer of illusions” (p.18)
“Fabrication of pseudo-needs” with the “reign of the autonomous economy” (p.19)
“Whatever is conscious wears out. What is unconscious remains unalterable” (p.19)
“The society of the spectacle, where the commodity contemplates itself in a world of its
He emphasizes the audience's mass self-seduction: "The group connected to the video is also only its own terminal. It records itself, self-regulates itself and self-manages itself electronically. Self-ignition, self-seduction. The group is eroticized and seduced through the immediate command that it receives from itself, self-management will
... See moreComrades of Time - Journal #11
e-flux.com
This article explores the complex relationship between contemporary art and the concept of 'the present,' arguing that true contemporaneity is marked less by immediacy and more by embracing the paradoxes of time—hesitation, repetition, and wasted or excessive time—as art collaborates with, rather than merely represents, time.
Takeaways:
-Contemporary art’s essence lies in its engagement with the present as a contested, non-linear, and often fragmented moment filled with hesitation and delay rather than straightforward presence.
-Modernity pushed for progress and efficiency, shedding tradition to survive, resulting in art practices that reduced complexity but revealed survival truths transcending culture.
-Time-based art exemplifies the contemporary by embracing repetition, waste, and suspended time, underscoring an irreducible experience of 'being-in-time' beyond productivity or historical narratives.
-The notion of being ‘con-temporary’ as 'comrades of time' suggests artists and art assist and collaborate with time in its complexities, particularly its 'problematic' unproductive moments.
-Contemporary spectatorship differs from traditional passive viewing; it's active yet ephemeral, involving multiple incomplete engagements that create a 'cool' mode of contemplation blending vita activa with vita contemplativa.
Inevitably, the fast pace of consumerism is accompanied by the tantalizing promise of slow time—Allen Ginsberg
La Chambre, Chantel Akerman