Matter
The Anthropocene Project. An Encyclopedia
What’s the matter? Matter lies at the center of a great deal, as do its processes of transformation. What happens when an ox is slaughtered, placed on the spit or in the microwave, then arriving at our plates and making its way down our digestive tract? From the viewpoint of farmers, doctors, food speculators, consumers? When copper or coltan is mined, inserted into mobile phones or computers, and winds up on special trash dumps in the global South? What if we understood thinking as a process of metabolism, as vapors, in the smallest grains and particles, radio waves or radioactive, mixed up, complemented, decaying, radiating. Abstract biochemistry. Or more sensually, via the body, the skin, our breath. Environmental pollutants, the Internet, pollen, air conditioners, money . . . the lines separating humanity and material are increasingly blurring. Perhaps we only grasp that we ourselves are material when we engage with other materials.
More information in the media section
A Report. A Matter Theater | Opening by Katrin Klingan
HKW Talk on the Anthropocene. With Eyal Weizman, Curator of Forensis and Bernd M. Scherer
HKW Talk on the Anthropocene. With Jan Zalasiewicz and Bernd M. Scherer
Forensics in the Anthropocene. With Adrian Lahoud, Min. 93:30-107
External links for further reading
The Metabolic Kitchen. Raumlabor
Anthropocene Observatory. Program
