Reciprocal Infrastructures: In Conversation with Susannah Haslam and Lou-Atessa Marcellin

PolyVocalCity 2023 was invited by the Whitechapel Radio Station (WRS) broadcast, for an afternoon exploring social and environmental justice for Croydon. Artist Verity Monroe presents a sonic live mixing of a collectively produced podcast by the PolyVocalCity participants and is joined by Croydon based artists James Elsey, dot.i and poets Shaniqua Benjamin, Mhairi Potts-Wyatt, Zhanai Wallace as well as PolyVocalCity member Jacqueline Ennis-Cole and guest Jumana Abboud.

On this episode of TM Live, TM’s programme curator Andrea Cetrulo is joined by Tyler Sonnichsen, cultural geographer and lecturer at Central Michigan University, who studies music, media, and oral histories. Through a selection of four DIY home brewed albums—some created in isolation—Tyler informs TM’s ongoing research on the home as infrastructure for cultural production, as well as the politics of music circulation, DIY aesthetics and media representations.

Professor of Mathematics at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Fernando Zalamea, joins Theatrum Mundi’s programme curator, Andrea Cetrulo to discuss how mathematical concepts can be applied to other disciplines such as philosophy, literature and architecture. In his book America: Una trama integral, recently translated into English as America: An Integral Weave, Fernando explores the particularities of America as a hybrid, formed by a multiplicity of creeds, ethnic groups, sensibilities, and artistic influences, which together form a form a weave or mixture reflecting the local and the universal. For a long time Latin America has occupied a marginal or peripheral position within the established world order, a position that far from resulting in isolationism or mimicry, blends and constructs new cosmogonies and realities. Our guest brings a rich selection of instances in which this hybridity has manifested in mathematical thought, philosophy, art and architecture. He is interested in the relationship between the local and the universal, the ‘pendularity’ or back and forth that will give rise to artists such as Frank Gehry, Anselm Kiefer, the Uruguayan artists Joaquin Torres Garcia and Vaz Ferreira and Colombian architect Rogelio Salmona.

Theatrum Mundi programme curator, Andrea Cetrulo is joined by dancer and professor of performance and the humanities at King's College London, author of the book Choreomania: Dance and Disorder, Kelina Gotman. They discuss her book, which deals with archival materials on the phenomenon called ‘choreomania’ (or dancing madness), initially employed to describe contagious popular dances: from antiquarian references to ancient Greek bacchanals and mediaeval St. Vitus’s dances to scientific reperformances of early modern religious ecstasies, and American government anthropology, ‘choreomania’ arose to signal every gestural and choreographic unrest. But how contagious was this dancing disease and what is it actually categorised as a disease throughout history?

For the second instalment of Hybrids, Theatrum Mundi programme curator Andrea Cetrulo is joined by David Monroe: sybarite, associate professor of Applied Ethics at St. Petersburg College in Florida, and former chef. They discuss the work of relatively obscure French author Michel Serres, who wrote extensively about the phenomenology of taste, culinary aesthetics, and wine, and conceptualised the figure of the parasite to describe relationships between humans, humans and non-humans and amongst non-human entities.  What can a bottle of good wine tell us about the local and the universal? How can taste teach us how to live a good life and become more discerning in our everyday choices? What is the philosophy of mingled bodies? And, is every relationship in this world fundamentally ‘parasitic’?

We are delighted to share the first episode of Hybrids: 𝙖 𝙥𝙤𝙙𝙘𝙖𝙨𝙩 𝙨𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙨 focusing on the notion of hybridity as contagion, symbiosis, mesh and mixture. How do distinct entities interact, feed from each other and combine, transcending their singularity and creating something new? Each episode will focus on exploring a manifestation of hybridity through the seemingly disparate lenses of dance, architecture, medical history, philosophy, ecology and gastronomy. On the first episode of Hybrids, Theatrum Mundi programme curator, Andrea Cetrulo is joined by architect, illustrator and co-editor of Feral Atlas, Feifei Zhou. Feral Atlas is a digital project that documents and expands the understanding of what occurs when nonhuman entities become tangled up with human-made infrastructures. We will discuss Feifei’s involvement with Feral Atlas, how she conceives and develops her illustrations for the site, and what her next project is about. How can architects and designers think about their role in creating and managing the world of the feral?

The second episode of Staging Cities looks at retail palaces and cultural icons over a conversation with writer Alia Trabucco Zerán, shortlisted for the 2019 Man Booker International Prize for her novel The Remainder (La Resta), and artist Bedwyr Williams, whose work was exhibited at Barbican Art Gallery, London, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, and Tramway, Glasgow, among many other institutions. Hosted by Marta Michalowska, Theatrum Mundi Sound design and editing by Philippe Frau-Nadal

The final episode in the first series of Staging Cities looks at improvised structures, radical ideas, nature and science in cities over a conversation with writer Sophie Mackintosh, whose debut novel The Water Cure was longlisted for the 2018 Man Booker Prize, and artist and writer Crystal Bennes, whose writing on architecture and design has appeared in international publications including Icon, Frieze, Disegno and Metropolis. Staging Cities is a new podcast from Theatrum Mundi, looking at ideas on the intersection of stagecraft, architecture and urban planning. We are borrowing from the toolkit of theatre-making to think about city-making. These new podcasts accompany a series of books we are working on with nai010 publishers from Rotterdam. Hosted by Marta Michalowska, Theatrum Mundi Sound design and editing by Philippe Frau-Nadal

This episode focuses on the key residential structure in the city – the concrete icon, the promise of high-rise living, the ghetto – through a discussion with writer Alison Irvine, author of novels This Road is Red (2011) and Cat Step (2020), and cartoonist Matthew Dooley, author of graphic novel Flake (2020), who both set their contributions to Concrete and Ink in tower blocks. Staging Cities is a new podcast from Theatrum Mundi, looking at ideas on the intersection of stagecraft, architecture and urban planning. We are borrowing from the toolkit of theatre-making to think about city-making. These new podcasts accompany a series of books we are working on with nai010 publishers from Rotterdam. Hosted by Marta Michalowska, Theatrum Mundi Sound design and editing by Philippe Frau-Nadal

TM research fellow, Susannah Haslam, and TM studio manager, Lou-Atessa Marcellin join programme curator Andrea Cetrulo in a conversation around cultural infrastructure.  Susannah and Lou have cultivated a friendship as they cultivated a garden together in south London. During these outdoor encounters, they’ve mused on ecosophy, how we can learn from non human organizations and what a return to modular principles of education, and lifelong learning could mean for our societies. Susannah talks about her fellowship with Theatrum Mundi, which draws on her doctoral studies and interest in alternative educational curricula. What does it actually mean to build a cultural institution? We also discuss the tension between innovation and stability, learning and unlearning, and the benefits and risks of becoming institutionalised. Lou is the founder of DIASPORE, a multidisciplinary research platform, as well as the School of Ronces (formerly NEWS seasonal school), which explore the making of landscapes in rural and urban environments. Image from: Eva Rowson's workshop at Tate Modern for Talking with Neighbours: reimagining the institution. Curated and produced by Andrea Cetrulo