Pulvis et umbra sumus. We are but dust and shadow. –Horace

Our inquiry is about changing relationships between human and non-human worlds, in what Whitehead calls “mysterious reality in the background, intrinsically unknowable“. We’re particularly interested in exploring ecological connections between worldviews, including kami (shinto), viriditas (christian mysticism) and panpsychism (philosophy). How can we translate animist or mystical attitudes towards interconnectedness of all life into worldviews compatible with contemporary (or future) techno-materialist societies? What kinds of relationships between human and non-human worlds could be cultivated in an era of mass-extinction? What parallel arts, sciences or technologies become possible if we widen the sentience spectrum? Our focus is on creating experiences to convey or encourage a sense of wonder (e.g. rituals, celebrations, contemplative environments, expeditions, physical narratives, etc). Our media include Romantic Machines, the vegetal mind, expanded publications, human scale systems, (spectrality), non-human technologies and various “disruptive acts of beauty”.

• fragments https://d-u-s-t-and-shadow.tumblr.com
• photos https://www.flickr.com/photos/foam/sets/72157681429258454

• fieldtrip 1 / FieldNotes #1: https://medium.com/@foam/dust-and-shadow-field-notes-1-48e94d02540b

How all of this might unfold (TBC and subject to change without notice)

• Spring 2017 (may/june): fieldtrip, observations, questions, travelogue, etc.
  
• Summer 2017 (july/august): articulating research questions, literature research, mapping, etc.
  
• Fall 2017 (end november → ~15th december): FoAM presentation/talk at LCT, research retreat, formulating hypotheses/propositions for experiments, commonplace publication pt1
  
• Spring 2018: temporary FoAM lab @ ASU: prototyping, experiments (first iteration), FoAM's 'injections' in (graduate) courses (?), commonplace publication pt2 (fieldguide for further experiments)
  
• Fall 2018 (or spring 2019): Second action research cycle, ending in a public experiment, printed publication (and possibly an 'exploded publication' in the form of an exhibition)
  
• (+ continuous online documentation)
  

[…]

• in progress → reader_1

• https://www.zotero.org/groups/dust_and_shadow/items
• dark ecology
• http://tinyletter.com/hautepop/letters/disturbances-12-anti-modern
• romantic machines, panpsychism, animism, etc, vegetal mind, human scale systems, non-human technologies
• the mushroom at the end of the world as counterpoint to in the dust of this planet
• Spiritualise, Revitalising spirituality to address 21st century challenges (RSA report)
• A counsel of resistance and delight
• Why spirituality is key to more visionary politics
• You want it darker
• Sensing nature
• The TAZ
• art and witchcraft (and Adam Nocek's Reclaiming Witchcraft)
• radical ecologies
• The American Wilderness Act of 1964
• etc.
• https://sandsystems.org/
• http://dark-mountain.net/blog/the-devils-door-a-call-for-contributions-to-issue-12/
• http://dark-mountain.net/blog/in-other-tongues-ecologies-of-meaning-and-loss/
• reading notes for Humankind: Solidarity with Nonhuman People
• The Spell of the Sensuos

Synthesis research streams

• Rhythmanalysis research stream (multiple projects): http://rhythmanalysis.weebly.com/
  

Time Lenses: http://rhythmanalysis.weebly.com/time-lenses-apparatus.html

• Improvisational environments http://improvisationalenvironments.weebly.com/
  
• Lighting and rhythm http://lightingrhythm.weebly.com/
  
• Experiential Model of the Atmosphere http://synthesiscenter.net/projects/ema/
  

We no longer have roots, we have aerials. We no longer have origins, we have terminals. –McKenzie Wark