Franco 'Bifo' Berardi

How to breathe inside the shitstorm

Transmission #2 - 30 May 2018

Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi delivers a talk followed by a Q&A on the subject of “How to breathe inside the shitstorm”. 

The increasingly chaotic rhythm of our respiration, and the sense of suffocation that grows everywhere: an essay on poetical therapy. Since the hopeful days of the Occupy movement, many things have changed in the respiration of the world, and we have entered a cycle of spasm, despair, and chaos. Breathing is a book about the increasingly chaotic rhythm of our respiration, about the sense of suffocation that grows everywhere. "I can't breathe." These words panted by Eric Garner before dying, strangled by a police officer on the streets of Staten Island, capture perfectly catching the overall sentiment of our time.

Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi is a writer and theorist based in Bologna. His work revolves mainly around the aesthetics of the contemporary psychosphere. Bifo’s latest books include Futurability. The Age of Impotence and the Horizon of Possibility (Verso, 2017), and And. Phenomenology of the End (Semiotexte 2015). His forthcoming book is titled Breathing. Chaos and Poetry (Semiotexte, 2018).

The talk was generously funded by the CHASE consortium development fund. Hosted by the Mountain of Art Research (MARs) and the Department of Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths College, University of London, the talk was introduced by Helena Reckitt. Special thanks to Felice Moramarco for facilitating the talk and discussion.