In this course, we will delve into themes of extraction, rest, and exhaustion in the context of the earth's depleted resources, the culture of burnout, and the relentless push toward data exhaustion. We will engage with questions such as: What if a work is created with its expiration in mind? What if its purpose is to rest? What materials could we use for decomposition and degrowth? How do we perform exhaustion for the camera? Can resistance to the exploitative nature of capitalism manifest as naps, encampments, and rest? We will explore extraction, exhaustion, and rest as starting points for non-production, slow production, degrowth, and what it means to expire a practice. Through this lens, we will critically engage with the pressures of hustle culture, the impact of bromaxxing, pre-workout supplements, metabolic rift, drinks for energy, drinks for rest, planetary mining, and delve into what Byung-Chul Han labels as auto-exploitative behaviors. This course will be composed of exercises, readings, a research presentation, and a final project.

This studio, Making Kin: Material Explorations in Friendship and Belonging, centers kinship as a method for making. For example, the notion of ‘friendship as entanglement’ lends itself to fiber-based artworks—of intertwined threads and interlocked fibers. Touchable objects made of silicone and hair would create an intimate haptic viewer experience. Archival and performative approaches to making are direct ways of exploring love and belonging. In this course, studio assignments encourage diverse approaches to kinship-making using conceptually-driven methods. Demonstrations are provided as needed to support students’ independent projects. Interpersonal relationships have within them certain embedded codes of behavior and privilege that inform how one is to think, feel, and relate. Those participating in forms of queer belonging often challenge the hegemony of marriage and the couple, and trouble the meaning of family, yet they do so outside the customs and laws that undergird kinship and affective relations. This studio begins with lesser-known forms of belonging with examples from the 19th century Oneida Community, Polyamory, Relationship Anarchy, and the concept of Expanded Affinities as a model of relating that means to redistribute care and extend our sense of belonging. Donna Haraway’s concept of the Cthulhu and s/f (string figures) provides terminology to think through interspecies and eco-relationships. bell hooks, Lauren Berlant, Laura Kipnis, and Dean Spade offer texts both for and against love. Authors Corinne Manning and Eve Sedjwick write on queer desire. Artistic examples include those from Jes Fan, Carlos Motta, Neo Muyanga, Wu Tsang, Ana Hoffner, Every Ocean Hughes, Corinne Teed, Boudry and Lorenz, and Sophie Calle.