LECTURES

Hito Steyerl

17/02/2010, 19:30 hrs, Dutch Art Institute

The Empire of Senses
What is a politics of affect? And how can it be changed? Contemporary politics are not merely aestheticised, but exercised as aesthetics. This Empire of Senses is built on shock and attraction, on desire and disgust, on hatred and hysteria, on feeling and fear. The power to trigger, channel, mediate and market those emotions is a characteristic of contemporary power as such. Contemporary news evoke a situation of constant exception, a crisis in permanence, a state of heightened alert and tension. The Empire of Senses, which has to be policed and repressed, has become the contemporary norm of perception.

Hito Steyerl
Hito Steyerl works as filmmaker, videoartist and author in the area of essayist documentary film. She lives in Berlin and has recently participated in documenta 12, 7th Shanghai biennial and many other international shows.