Artist Ranu Mukherjee discusses the body politic, somatic experience, and violence in society. They explore power dynamics, the role of imagination, and the misinterpretation of saving the planet. Topics range from deep time to leadership and the interconnectedness of trauma.
Our bodies hold the essence of societal ruptures and violence, shaping our experiences and perspectives.
Connecting with different time registers influences power structures and understanding of existence.
Imagination and speculative fiction are pivotal in embodying personal and collective ruptures, fostering resilience.
Deep dives
Exploration of Rupture and Violence
Ranu Mukherjee and the host delve into the essential nature of rupture and violence as part of nature and human-caused destruction. They discuss the somatic experience, connection, scale, and difficulties of societal accountability within systems of scale.
Understanding Time and Registers
The conversation expands to explore time through different registers, including geological time, ancestral time, and present time. Ranu shares her work focusing on connecting with various time registers and how they impact our understanding of existence and power hierarchies.
Imagination, Rupture, and Change
The discussion transitions to the significance of imagination in contemplating rupture and change. Ranu emphasizes the importance of speculative fiction as a tool for embodying personal and collective ruptures, offering insights into reinvention and resilience.
Decentralizing Power and Care
The concluding segment examines the interplay between power, safety, and unsafety within leadership dynamics. The conversation highlights the necessity to decentralize systems, advocate for change, and embrace uncertainty with a focus on scaling imagination and enhancing collective consciousness.
Suggestions for Further Exploration
Ranu proposes potential guests for future discussions, including Alia Vargas, Alicia Escott, and Sophia Cordova, each offering unique perspectives on topics like oil exploration, linguistics, and envisioning diverse futures. These recommendations aim to deepen the dialogue around complex societal issues and creative solutions.
Shifts in culture, ravages of violence, ruptures and reconciliation—the body politic lives in our own bodies, informing and inhibiting our experience in the world. Yet, we fail to recognise this connection, and the even wider one of our own bodies as part of the earth's system, which is experiencing great violence and chaos. We need to reconnect with our bodies.
Ruptures is just one of the themes Ranu Mukherjee explores as an artist. She joins me to discuss this, and the somatic experience, deep time, the lives of plants, and the violence that ripples out through society. We explore the limitations of connection in economies of scale, how this informs our power hierarchies, and the violence we then internalise, which leads us to a beautiful conversation on uncertainty.