Asier Mendizabal

Lisa Tan: Dodge and/or Burn is conceived as a continuation of the artist’s eponymous solo exhibition at Accelerator gallery, Stockholm. Inspired by a drawing made by the famous neurologist Oliver Sacks representing the physiological organization of migraines, Tan created a system of “open walls” for viewers to navigate. Her attention to “the intersection between the nervous system and interior life as a way of examining how art operates, uncertainty, and the formation of the self” is deepened in the publication thanks to the essays of three authors whose work has affected Tan’s thinking. Psychoanalyst Charlotta Björklind and artist Asier Mendizabal analyze the overlapping of inner and outer life, the misalignment of subjective experience from representations of it, and negotiations between mind and brain, while the narration of writer Haytham el-Wardany meditates on the breath between words. Throughout the book, at the top of the pages, runs a transcription of the voice-over monologue from Tan’s video Dodge and Burn (2021–23).

Notes on Ex-Futures contains a description of the process by Johanna Gustafsson Fürst, the text by Asier Mendizabal that formed the starting point of the project, and a text by philosopher Michael Marder who, as part of this process, held a lecture at the Royal Institute of Art. But first and foremost, it is a compilation of reactions and reflections from a group of art students. Contributors in alphabetical order: Annie Åkerman, Tilde Björk, Sarali Borg, Leona Cauklija, Zeynep Çolpan, Stella Dieden Richter, Philip Dufva, Viktoria Ekdahl, Axel Gagge, Johanna Gustafsson Fürst, Sanna Håkans, Anna Heymowska, Manju Jatta, Vladyslav Kamensky, Nicole Khadivi, Johanna Kindahl, Olga Krüssenberg, Andrea Larsson, Linnea Lindberg, Sebastian Lindén, Johan Lundborg, Lina Lundquist, Michael Marder, Mari Mattsson, Asier Mendizabal, Kayo Mpoyi, Kristina Nenzén, Christopher Robin Nordström, David Permén, Ebba Rost, Sonia Sagan, Ossian Söderqvist, Erik Thörnqvist, Aex Valijani, Andreas Widoff, Hedvig Wijkström, Sofia Zwahlen