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The Immaterialist

resilient living in a limitless world

Author: khharper

January 28, 2023

Sustainable storytelling

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January 18, 2023

What is home?

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December 21, 2022December 21, 2022

Embrace your despair – it might set you free

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November 24, 2022December 21, 2022

Rebel, Reframe, Rewild

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November 11, 2022November 11, 2022

Follow me into the wild

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November 3, 2022January 26, 2023

You cannot step into the same river twice

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October 14, 2022October 18, 2022

An antidote to sustainable luxury

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October 5, 2022October 6, 2022

Anti-trendy design: a hymn to rawness, flexibility and repairability

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September 20, 2022October 5, 2022

Whatever Lasts: Ongoing conversation with Isabelle McAllister

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From the most intense beauty; colours so crisp you can almost taste them, sweet tropical fruits, deep blue skies, waterfalls, and serene, picturesque views, to intense, stinky traffic, dog fights, dudes selling rabbits from small cages, and barking short-legged monsters. Bali you have it all.!

Two nights ago lightening struck our house. Not metaphorically speaking. No, lightening actually hit us! I have never experienced anything like it before (and probably never will again). The sound, the flash of light, and after that, the darkness (as it wiped ou all our electrical installations). Intense! Sublime! Scary! Beautiful! We were lucky, I guess, as nothing happened besides from lightpulps popping and routers being fried. But also lucky to experience this immense force of nature. So bright! So loud! And, the craziest thing of it all is that lightening struck exactly above my desk, where I sit for hours every day and write!

New blog post at The Immaterialist blog (link in bio) with the exhibition text I have written for the current solo exhibition by amazing @lydiajanssenart @redseagallery 🤍

I am writing about time at the moment: About whether or not time feels the same in all places: for example; does time feel different in the forest than in the city? This could be of course dependent on our experience of time; maybe in a city we feel the high pace of life and therefore we experience time as moving quickly, whereas in a forest where peace and quiet is typically predominant, time might feel slower. But, I want to take this a step further; I seriously think that time is different in a forest than in a bustling city. When you are in the presence of some of the stagnant, old beings of the world, like trees, time slows down. I am not just talking about the calming effect that trees can have on us, but on time really being different than in a place characterised by quick replacements and short-lived constructions (- when this is said, it could be an interesting (thought-)experiment to investigate the ability of longerterm constructions and artefacts as well as buildings made to last and to be shaped by usage to affect and slow down time). Not than experiencing time as slow is always per se a good thing. But the consensus in our late-modern reality tends to be that time is scarce, and therefore positive connotations tend to be attached to slowness.

Thank you 2022 ✨🙏

I am preparing an article on what new (sustainable) luxury is. It's a really difficult topic, I think. It would make sense for me to write about sumptuous products made to last, slow, ethically produced fashion gowns, simple, yet exclusive, eco-resorts, new edible packaging materials, and slow, sensuously intense dining experiences.

In 2023 I wish for more of what I loved the most in 2022: being outside barefooted, sleeping in simple huts and falling asleep to the sound of the ocean, researching the potential of uncultivated behaviour, reading mind-blowing books (novels, poetry, nonfiction, anything really: there is so much to learn and love), listening to music, having inspiring conversations (that make my urge to write erupt), exploring the crazy beautiful part of the world I live in - and of course (yet, not taken for granted) spending time with my beloved family and friends.

Last night I went out for dinner with my family. My teenage son and I came 45 minutes before the rest of the family, and we had a conversation that made me want to read up on existentialist philosophy; particularly Kierkegaard and de Beauvoir.

“What you make from a tree should be at least as miraculous as what you cut down.” Richard Powers, The Overstory

Bali, sometimes, in those magical moments I don't know what to do with you, with your beauty, your contrasts, your colours. You are too much for me. Too much for my senses, too much for my mind 🙏

I remember clearly when I first saw the iconic photo-collage by American postmodern artist Barbara Kruger with the catchphrase, I shop therefore I am. Rewriting the seminal Rene Descartes-sentence, I think therefore I am, is such a powerful and symptomatic way of capturing the essence of modern-day consumerism. We are no longer citizens, we are consumers. And it could appear that only through the act of consumption do we exist or feel meaningful, powerful and free. We have gotten used expressing our opinions, feelings and identity through our purchasing power. What we buy and do not buy has become political; it is a more influential act that voting at an election. Just think about that for a second. Has our democracy really been reduced to the freedom to select whether or not we buy ecological groceries, or whether or not we buy fast fashion clothes or choose to shop secondhand?

When I talk about the importance of reducing consumption radically (which I often do), I am often asked: how can I do that? (which is of course a very fair question)

The process of rewilding nature involves creating the ideal circumstances and then taking a step back and letting nature adjust and mold it in its own way - which might not be anything like what you imagine. Maybe rewilded nature doesn’t look like nature we are acquainted with. Maybe it doesn't take shape as a rainforest or a savannah. Maybe rewilded nature forms new kinds of ecosystems and bionetworks that can ensure the survival of plants and animals in ways that we cannot even imagine. Maybe rewilded nature looks and acts in ways that enables new lifeforms to occur and that celebrate diversity by merging plants. Restoring is about reconstructing and reestablishing something that has been lost (due to decay, usage, weathering, climate changes, pollution, or something else that has induced change in a negative way). Rewilding is about opening up to both newness and oldness, to life that always flows, and to cycles that ensure durability. The process of rewilding (whether nature or human beings) is an ode to development, transformation and innovation; it doesn’t romanticize foregone eras nor does it involve slowing everything down to a state of non-movement. Rewilding is a celebration of the uncultivated way of life: of rawness and the beauty of imperfection, of blossoming, wild, free lifeforms, and of diversity and colorful, resilient rhythms.

According to philosopher F. Schiller, experiencing only beauty and harmony keeps us stuck in the concrete, perceptible, hands-on reality. Clinging to the familiar, the safe, and the immediately understandable—to “smoothness,” convenience, and ease—without seeking or daring to engage in challenges leads to stagnation—and a lack of freedom. However, the sublime, as opposed to the beautiful, which Schiller connects to chaotic or unbounded experiences, can shock us and wake us up from our slumber and thereby remind us of our full potential—as well as empower us to alter our ways if needed. It is of great importance to occasionally be confronted with the chaotic elements of reality. This is why Schiller underlines the importance of the sublime aesthetic experience: a single sublime shock can tear apart what Schiller calls “the veil of illusions” and can thus create a momentary experience of “true beauty,” which occasions clarity.

In a strange way, what I read coincided with what I was. I read about the raging sea as the sea raged, I read about the whispering forest as the forest whispered, and when I read that to pray was not to speak, but to become silent, that only in silence could God's kingdom be sought, God's kingdom came. God's kingdom was the moment. The trees, the forest, the sea, the lily, the bird, all existed in the moment. To them, there was no such thing as future or past. Nor any fear or terror. That was the first turning point. The second came when I read what followed: What happens to the bird does not concern it. It was the most radical thought I had ever known. It would free me from all pain, all suffering. What happens to me does not concern me.

My book Aesthetic Sustainability is still timely. Link in bio 🌿

New post at The Immaterialist Blog. On the development of my three raw, sustainable Rs: Rebel, Reframe and Rewild. Link in bio.

Is the 'function' of design objects mainly functional?

Isabelle: Of course I want to be free! But sometimes boundaries makes me feel better and makes a lot of things easier. But I also want those boundaries to be self-imposed. (...)

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