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The Immaterialist

resilient living in a limitless world

Tag: consumerism

June 2, 2023June 2, 2023

My precious

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April 5, 2023May 23, 2023

Democratic sustainability

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January 5, 2022June 10, 2022

Designing new objects in a world with way too many things

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November 30, 2021February 21, 2023

Interview #11: Bio-designer and Artist Zena Holloway

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September 17, 2021February 23, 2023

Interview #9: Lisa Wells, author of ‘Believers’

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June 21, 2021February 16, 2023

Balance is the key to sustainable consumption

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In a sense, finishing a design-object completely before releasing it into the world is a little peculiar, if the object is made to be used, which I assume design-objects generally are. If something is completely done, with nothing to be added or taken away, the process of usage can only allow for deterioration moving toward a quickly approaching end.

Life lately 🙏❤️

Is being a consumer an identity? Late-modern, privileged consumption is interlinked with feel-good-experiences, acknowledging gazes and status symbols — well, in general with experiences rather than with getting fed and nourished (which you might initially, naïvely, think consumption was all about, given the word) or with being clothed and sheltered.

Life can be cheap here in Bali. These little absurdly coloured chicks cost 5000 rupiah (under half a dollar) and this sweet little boy bought himself a pink one today. To play with I guess (gently I hope). Cuteness and brutality in one photo.

My family and I recently leased land here in Bali–a blissful little piece of heaven overlooking rice fields with the majestic volcano Mount Agung towering in the background. As we started digging up the soil to plant vegetables and fill the land with bamboo and fruit trees, my awareness of the immense plastic pollution we are facing here in Bali reached new heights. There were generations of plastic in the soil! I almost felt like an archeologist digging through layers, observing the different states of my findings. The further down I dug, the more old, dirty plastic surfaced. Some of the plastic that had clearly been there for years had the texture of parchment paper and was thin and porous, but still far from a state of deterioration. There were also old polyester clothes. And even shoes. Since there is hardly any governmental waste management here in Bali, a lot of trash is thrown in nature. And, when a piece of land, neighbouring a village, is uninhabited for a while (like ours was) it tends to become the village dumpster.

Sunset bliss ❤️just me and my dog 🙏

Beautiful or aesthetically nourishing things can subsume and “fill” us in a nearly spiritual way, or at least to seem neither strictly physical nor reflexive. Aesthetically nourishing things satisfy in a very different way than material comfort or products that support our identity and status. Rather, such nourishing things fill us mentally while also sustaining us sensuously.

Resilient living is definitely not an ode to dishwashing, which sometimes seems to be the case of slow living, but still, exercising a calm, peaceful mind while carrying out daily tasks that might not seem immediately fulfilling or rewarding can make such tasks feel like the chorus of one’s daily hymn.

“When sustaining a craft tradition preserving cultural and regional characteristics is of great importance. Doing so is also a way of underlining that these particular motifs and patterns are “owned” by this specific region and people despite the fact that they do not have the copyright.

Despite all the sustainable design arguments that favour repetition, endurance, and longevity, not all things, actions, or relationships become better or remain valuable and nourishing when repeated or with time.

In love with my new neighbourhood ❤️ #nature #bliss #bali #ricefields #garden

Our house journey. It’s not quite over, but we are getting there 🙏❤️

"Having the time of becoming manifest as visible or tactile traces in the object can also be a way to avoid that the object will seem too “polished,” disinviting use. In the case of polished objects, normal use tends to leave obvious signs of wear-and-tear very quickly, which is not flattering. But the wear-and-tear of object surfaces that have been designed to being touched and used can easily make the object appear more beautiful, more interesting, or more attractive."

I have been writing a lot lately on deconstruction, upcycling and hacking discarded things (especially clothes). Inspired by deconstructivism, which has its roots in postmodern, semiotic philosophy, and is linked to the French philosopher Jacques Derrida and deconstructivist postmodern "anti-architecture", I just published an article on Medium about anti-design and garment-hacks.

I don’t know if there is such a thing a a rice-field-sunset-bath - but I just had one 🙏❤️

In one of my favourite books on rawness and rewilding, Feral by George Monbiot, Monbiot tells about a 6-year long blissful wild adventure in the tropics he enjoyed as a young man, and how he, after returning to England, found himself ecologically bored, and quickly longed for a rawer life.

Life—and aesthetic nourishment—lately. 🙏❤️

Mujo is a word originated in Buddhism, which summarily means transience or mutability. As all things are impermanent, never-ending subjects to change, the human need for persistence and security materialises in our tendency to accumulate lots of material possessions that we store in our increasingly big home-boxes, but which inevitably leads to despair. The only way out of despair is to let go of attachment and accept that our lives are not fixed or static, but dynamic, constantly changing, and ever evolving.

I am in the process of starting a small sustainable luxury brand called @illusi_indonesia - working with the empowerment of groups of talented weavers in small villages in Bali and Lombok.

Walks in our new neighbourhood 🌱🌴 This is going to be good. (Even though the house is still a bit of a mess, and the garden looks like a construction site)

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