“Myth is very precisely the incantation that gives rise to a world…”

– Jean-Luc Nancy, The Inoperative Community (1986)

In a time of eco-crises, techno-uto/dystopias, disaster capitalism and necropolitics, communities the world over are compelled to examine the economic systems and narratives that have driven them towards cataclysm. As Janus-faced digital economies, venture capitalists, fintech merchants and enterprise software barons increasingly mediate labour relations in a peri-pandemic world, a vortex of imperialism invents new ways to extract value from the ever-expanding precariat. In this context, we hurtle into futures formed by technologies that engender their own community mythos.

In The Inoperative Community, Nancy describes myth as a recitation through which community is conjured; its origins narrated, its destinies explained. Today myths are propagated, busted, contorted and exported through myriad of file formats, fiscal loopholes and economic fora. While the pataphysical geographies of finance create offshore tax-havens for the oligarchy, the glamour of this expedient economic rhetoric is forever undermined by the stench of its desolation.

MoneyLab #X Economythologies critically explores the working and un-working of myths that have/do/will shape our economic realities. Embracing the non-linearity of time and the multiplicity of actants that construct our economythologies, the program seeks to widen the aperture of our future.  How might we conjure, in the words of VNS Matrix (1991) “the virus of the new world disorder/rupturing the symbolic from within” as “saboteurs of big daddy mainframe”?

This project was launched with a 2-day event and exhibitions , taking place across Ainslie+Gorman Arts Centre (Canberra) and Bett Gallery (Hobart) on 5th-6th November. The videos from these livestreamed sessions can now be found on their relevant topic pages. 

If you would like to spread the word about MoneyLab #X – Economythologies, please take a look at our press kit, where you’ll find further information and collateral about our programme. You may also wish to participate in our community scrapbooking project, which will continue to grow and transform over the coming year.

Economythologies organisers

Curators: Denise Thwaites and Nancy Mauro-Flude

Designer: Shahee Ilyas

Publications Coordinator: Alexandra Mossop

Organising Committee: Denise Thwaites, Nancy Mauro-Flude, Shahee Ilyas, Baden Pailthorpe, Katrina Sluis, Nick Smithies, Geert Lovink and Ned Rossiter