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| Toxoplasma Tachyzoites |
A Productive Irritant : Parasitical Inhabitations in Contemporary Art
Post Brothers and Chris Fitzpatrick
(..)
"What is at stake in a parasitic action? What happens when roles are inverted and dependencies revealed? Does the parasite reflect an impasse in transgression where there is no longer an oppositional position from outside, but where change is only conceivable from the inside? What can the parasite tell us about the interdependencies necessary for social and communication systems? The intimate yet poisonous interaction between parasite and host surely provides a more nuanced way of charting exploitation between parties, but does interrupting essentialist binary models of abuse allow for identification between others, or does it wipe away the problems between them? Does the parasite offer a model for the host, a way of institutional arrangement that recognizes and evolves through intrusion? Can an institution be built that reveres and learns from the parasite without making it one of its own? Is the parasite contagious? Can subtle interruptions in specific spaces effect broader structural and ideological shifts? When some projects bring external or marginalized voices into the institution, what is their dependence on the institution’s contradictions? Is their inclusion just a simple use of a middleman so that the institution does not have to confront its own exclusions? In every case of parasitical practice, the first question is, who is parasiting whom? Though this is not the last question.
Perhaps to think through parasites is to use the parasite as an optical device with which to see relations break down; perhaps to work parasitically is to make those relations more visible. And yet perhaps it is less about why than what for."
https://fillip.ca/content/parasitical-inhabitations-in-contemporary-art
