Fictioning: The Myth-Functions of Contemporary Art and Philosophy

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Written very much against the grain of canonical art history and theory – at least in its conservative, patriarchal and traditionalist modes – Fictioning functions more like a critical sourcebook for a visionary arts education yet-to-come. Fictioning makes a strong and sustained case for the pragmatic intimacy of the technological and aesthetic dimensions and, by extension, the scholarly and the performative. So, first of all, I mentioned ‘world creation’ above and, clearly, with tabletop roleplaying games there is a kind of world making that goes on beyond fiction per se.

There is also much more to say about this, but it is not just my own story and so I leave it to one side—except to draw something important from this determining factor: there were always two of us (at least) and so there was always already a community and a discourse happening around these experiences and this world creation. From the scale of living bodies, to landmasses, and even on a planetary one – our world is saturated with processes and relations that are exhausting. On the other hand, you could use the book, as I have, as a companion that urges you to delve more deeply into the artists Burrows and O'Sullivan mention and immerse yourself in their fictioning worlds, especially in the case of sound artists.

O’Sullivan (2019), Fictioning: The Myth-Functions of Contemporary Art and Philosophy, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. One in particular is worth mentioning here, Traveller, which was the Science Fiction equivalent of Dungeons and Dragons and, as such, involved more explicit world building (in terms of the flora and fauna, level of technological development, and so forth of a given planet). This section is followed by a third and final part on ‘mythotechnesis’ and the related idea of a kind of machine fictioning, concerning ‘the ways in which technology enters into discourse and life’ (1) and attending to ‘technics of adaptation and cloning, as well as technologies of coding, compression and layering, and also editing, scanning, time-stretching and pasting ’(7).

This exhaustion is consequential; we glamorise producing but overlook the exhaustion and even fatigue that might follow it. Zowel uitputting als comfort kunnen begrepen worden als toestanden, performatieve handelingen, landschappen en condities die ons begrip van de wereld voortdurend vormen – ze beïnvloeden de manier waarop we leven en onze leefomgeving vormgeven. In relation to this—and, indeed, the footnote above—I should also say that the following comments are indebted to a wider ‘community of interest’.Fictioning’ here alludes to “an open-ended, experimental practice that involves performing, diagramming or assembling to create or anticipate new modes of existence” and thus not to fiction writing per se, but the book turns out to be just as unputdownable as the best novel you can lay your hands on, or as hypnotic as Plastique Fantasique’s tunes for that matter. It is certainly within the realms of art—broadly conceived—that we see explorations of and experiments with these other imaginaries (our own work focussed on Science Fiction and the more non-human imaginaries in play there [see Burrow and O’Sullivan 2018: 275-93]). De sociale en politieke druk om continu productief te zijn heeft een prijs: een nooit aflatende stroom werk én overproductie, met als resultaat de consumptie van gevoelige lichamen en allerlei andere middelen. Metzinger, Thomas (2009), The Ego Tunnel: The Science of the Mind and the Myth of the Self, New York: Basic Books. It is a deceptively scholarly tome, like a Health and Safety-tested psychedelic trip conducted in a university lab with funding from the AHRC.

Following a broadly historical arc, Fictioning is organised into three overlapping sections, each subdivided into paired variations on the theme. Het collectieve project Fictioning Comfort bevat werken die een maatschappijkritische positie innemen door ‘fictioning’ (de handeling van verbeelden en uitbeelden) in relatie te brengen met verschillende gebruiken rondom ‘comfort’. The slight puzzlement about what we were doing (the game was initiated by an older boy) and then the moment it all fell into place—again, the penny dropped. The authors mention more often than not relatively obscure artists and the small black and white illustrations don’t do these justice. And, for example, that the intense and exciting experiences art can offer are not as intense or exciting—for me—as those I have had in the spaces and places of club culture and, especially the ‘free party’ scene (although it is perhaps also the case that art practice can extend certain characteristics of these experiences—develop them in interesting ways; this seems to be especially the case with collectives and performance).

His book Undead Uprising: Haiti, Horror and the Zombie Complex (MIT/Strange Attractor, 2017) explores the uses of Haiti as a locus for Euro-American fears about African culture, spirituality and revolutionary excess in the Americas, and their sublimation into popular horror tropes. The skills developed included writing short form essay, critical writing and creative fiction/non-fiction and publishing/readership knowledge exchange. The presentation of Fictioning Comfort is in thoughtful correspondence with the circumstances of our world today during the pandemic crisis.