In the cycle of life, the decomposition of matter releases nutrients that allow organisms to be born, grow, die, and decompose in turn. Essential to all living organisms, this microbiological process is closely linked to regeneration. Decomposition is a promise of rebirth. However, in the imagination associated with it, the idea of decomposition causes disgust and a feeling of abjection. Rot, putrefaction, mould, or deterioration are just some of the words that feed the repugnance and apprehension aroused by decay.<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Yet decomposition doesn\u2019t only impact organic matter. It also affects mineral or synthetic materials, gradually transforming buildings and infrastructures into rubble. Dilapidation, decrepitude, and ruin are therefore added to our evocative vocabulary. Metaphorically, we associate these phenomena with societal decline and the collapse of political and economic structures, even with the destruction of our civilization. In this context, disgust also transforms into terror and apocalyptic visions. How can we envision rebirth in a world on the brink of collapse?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In her book The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins<\/em>, anthropology professor Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing aptly writes: \u201cIn a global state of precarity, we don\u2019t have choices other than looking for life in this ruin. Our first step is to bring back curiosity.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a><\/span> 1 <\/a> - Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins<\/em> (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2015), 10.<\/span> In this issue, we have tried to let curiosity lead the way, not only so as to see beauty in rotting matter, but also to discover, through art, other ways of considering our decline. Once more in metaphorical terms, we need to delve into the rubble in order to extract the nutrients that will nourish artmaking and allow us to reflect on a future world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This issue focuses on decomposition from a variety of angles: we analyse artworks that use mycelium, compost, trimmings, dust, or any other materials altered by natural or chemical processes; still lifes in which hedonism and the macabre coexist; reproductions of ruins and necropolises; as well as projects that look at societal decline, environmental degradation, or the impact of biopolitics on humans and other-than-humans. Lastly, in certain sound works, matter is abandoned, making way for acoustic degradation, another type of de-composition<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Inevitably, the theme leads to reflections on loss and mourning. The challenge posed by this feature has been to avoid an elegiac tone in the discourse about our disappearance and instead turn our gaze to the restorative power of decomposition, both in environmental as well as social and cultural terms. This is not accomplished without at the same time also critiquing extractivist policies, consumerist lifestyles, and certain land-use practices that have led civilization to its current state. Although, for example, developers consider the revitalization of certain neighbourhoods as a way of combatting urban decay, for others, the ensuing gentrification is at the very root of the breakdown of the social fabric. Under such circumstances, we are asked to contemplate the ruin as fertile ground for changing the paradigm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the other hand, it is important to remember that in art as in architecture, as well as in the neocapitalist system, decomposition is antithetical to issues of preservation (of works, buildings, capital), which are fundamental to our quest for permanence. The deterioration of works or archival documents that preserve memory is a process that our society wishes to delay at all cost. Yet as Xenia Benivolski emphasizes in this issue, \u201cpreservation is often re-enacted in the interests of capital\u201d while, in contrast, \u201cdecay may be a mode of resistance and transformation.\u201d Whether in sonic or physical terms, artists reflect on ways of producing ephemeral works that return to the earth or simply live on in our memories. Working with decomposition, therefore, implies letting go of a work\u2019s outcome. Several projects in this feature embrace this idea by collaborating with living matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lastly, this issue circumvents repugnance, returning to decomposition the fundamental role and nobleness it deserves. Yet in order to attain rebirth, we must first pay homage to aging and accept finitude. In other words, we must welcome impermanence. For life to start all over again, we must allow the substance forming it to rot in peace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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