Potential Worlds

The ecological crisis the world is currently experiencing calls for an urgent rethinking of our relationship to nature, natural resources and the entirety of life on planet Earth, as well as that of humans between each other. It also highlights that time has come for repurposing coexistence, aided by post-human thought and technological advancement, and to realise that humans are merely part of rather than the centre of our world. This book questions forms of knowledge developed in the course of annexation of the environment and asks which ideas of nature might emerge from the current crisis and how we might perceive nature in the future. Positions of 36 artists from around the world examine the ecological and social consequences of the past and ongoing conquests of land for purposes of accumulating power and resources. Essays by Benjamin H. Bratton, T. J. Demos, Reza Negarestani, and Jussi Parikka shed light on aspects such as colonialism, post-humanism, ecology, and artistic adaption of new technologies, and investigate the potentials of mankind in alliance with nature and the role of art in this undertaking as a technological, scientific, and social experiment. Concise texts on the work of the participating artists and an introduction by the editors round out this illustrated book.