Today, as contemporary globalized society continues to heat the planet and as the post-1945 international order continues to be subverted and unravelled, nations are doubling down on fossil energy and further slashing social solidarity programs in order to rearm and prepare for war. The race to weaponize artificial intelligence (AI) must be considered part of this tendency. Meanwhile access to critical minerals is motivating gangster-like moves and territorial expansionist rhetoric from the former global hegemon. While the morbid symptoms of these processes are watched with stunned fascination, the social forces and tendencies that cause them are getting far less attention. Capitalist modernity, accelerated by disruptive technologies and algorithmic finance, has an unsolved energy problem. Growth and techno-acceleration are unsustainable except, it seems evident, as war and ruination. Even as AI proliferates, soon to be joined by remote gene editing, the progress stories of modernity are severely in doubt. Today the future is perhaps more uncertain than at any other time in modern history.

As current socio-ecological crises deepen, the commons and commoning have emerged as a key locus of theoretical reflection and practical invention from below. Research into the commons and into the possible intersections of artistic and commoning practices is highly relevant at this time. Arts of Commoning will carry out a research process that culminates in an exhibition of new commissioned artworks exploring the actualities, imaginaries and potentialities of commons and commoning in the new era of polycrisis and naked climate imperialism. The contribution of this research project is to focus artistic research on commons forms and practices within a precisely articulated contextual, historical and planetary framework.


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