[-empyre-] keeping Contamination open through Sunday.

[Renate Terese Ferro]

Hello all, 
I am keeping the topic of Contamination open one more day through Sunday evening in hopes that our guests may feel compelled to add one more comment.  

Thanks to Amy for picking up on so many threads and to Ian for the contamination manifesto.  Pop up ads contaminate the interfaces of the web similar to the way Ian’s banners of critical phrases do.  My favorites are…. Inhabit the polluted, escape enclosure, attack the antiseptic….

Thank you Melinda for writing about the Indigenous spaces of the Australian desert reminding us how location, eco-homeostasis, and culture become interwoven with issues of contamination, seepage, enclosure, and disclosure.  The Thunder Raining mages and the Kulata Tjuta images you linked were moving and incredibly rich.  

And to Ricardo your posts on effluvia prompted me to successfully find Mauss’ In A General Theory of Magic in the Cornell Library. Thanks to your poetic posts. 

And to Ben the medicinal and cleansing properties of mushrooms were an interesting addition to our discussion on Contamination.  I agree with Murat I would love to know more!  

This is a busy time of year for most of us as the semesters are ending but I will remind you all that the idea for this month’s topic was inspired by a large symposium at Columbia and e-flux in New York City on Toxic Assets.  I thought our month was a rich array of brainstormed synapses and I think all of you this month for joining in. 

We will be taking the month of December off but we will be back on or around January 7th.  Wishing you all a wonderful holiday and brilliant New Year. 
Warmly, 
Renate Ferro


Renate Ferro
Visiting Associate Professor
Director of Undergraduate Studies
Department of Art
Tjaden Hall 306