Only a few days left to see Lisa Tan’s exhibition at Accelerator, but Dodge and/or Burn lives on – in book form. Now, Accelerator invites you to a double celebration on 8 February: book launch and finissage!

During the evening, Lisa Tan and James Taylor-Foster, writer and curator at ArkDes, will meet in a conversation with the publication and its texts as their starting point. We’ll say good night to the exhibition with an extra special viewing to follow the talk.

The brand new book Dodge and/or Burn, published and distributed by Mousse Publishing, has partly developed in parallel with the exhibition at Accelerator. Psychoanalyst Charlotta Björklind, author Haytham el-Wardany and professor and artist Asier Mendizabal are three voices that have strongly influenced Tan’s process, or as she puts it: “changed the way I think”. In this publication, their texts reflect on the exhibition through the diciplines – art, literature and psychology – that Dodge and/or Burn build upon.

In addition to these texts, there are traces of Lisa Tan’s own voice (those who have visited the exhibition will be able to identify it more easily), curator Therese Kellner provides additional material and background to the exhibition and the institution’s artistic director Richard Julin to Accelerator’s.

Accelerator Café
Thursday 8 February
The conversation starts at 18:00
Language: English
Free entry, no registration required
The café and exhibition space are open until 20:00.

Credits Mousse Publishing

Publishing editor: Ilaria Bombelli
Graphic design: Anna Azzali

Biographies

ASIER MENDIZABAL is an artist and Professor of sculpture at KKH, Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm. The representations of the collective, the construction of identities and the role of technique in these phenomena recur throughout his work. His practice confronts conventional narratives of history assigned to archival or ethnographic objects, as well as subcultural representations, observing their political, technical and material conditions. Writing is a common instrument in his work, always in relation to sculpture as a practice and a genealogy. Mendizabal has exhibited individually in Museo Reina Sofía, MACBA and Raven Row, and collectively in Vienna Secession, Guggenheim Bilbao, Museu Serralves, Manifesta 5 and the Venice, São Paulo and Taipei biennials, among others.

CHARLOTTA BJÖRKLIND is a practicing child, youth and adult psychoanalyst, member of the Swedish Psychoanalytical Association (IPA). She is a teacher and supervisor at the Psychoanalytical Association’s Institute and at the Department of Psychology at Stockholm University. Also a member of the editorial board of Divan journal for psychoanalysis and culture, the Swedish Psychoanalytical Association’s publication series, and former editor-in-chief of the EPF Bulletin (European Psychoanalytic Federation). As a writer, she has participated in the anthology Vad är en kvinna: språk, materialitet, situation (Daidalos, 2021) (What is a woman: language, materiality, situation) and Freud och dödsdriften (Tankekraft, 2021) (Freud and the Death Drive), as well as contributed to numerous Swedish and international journals.

HAYTHAM EL-WARDANY is a writer and translator. He lives and works in Berlin. His latest book, Jackals and The Missing Letters (Al-Karma 2023), considers forgotten expressions of hope within Arabic fables, where animals speak and humans listen, in a moment of post “Arab Spring” speechlessness. In previous publications, including The Book of Sleep and How to Disappear, el-Wardany has examined the potential of passivity, through regimes of listening and the dialectics of sleep and vigilance. Forthcoming is Things That Can’t Be Fixed, a short story collection. He is the recipient of the Keith Haring Fellowship in Art and Activism 2022/2023.

JAMES TAYLOR-FOSTER is a writer, cultural critic, and curator of design and digital culture trained in architecture. They are the curator of contemporary architecture and design at ArkDes and have developed a number of curatorial projects in Stockholm including Cruising Pavilion: Architecture, Gay Sex and Cruising Culture and Space Popular: Value in the Virtual, alongside public installations with Studio Ossidiana, Swedish Girls, and others. They curated WEIRD SENSATION FEELS GOOD – the first museum exhibition to explore the culture and creative field of ASMR, currently touring. Most recently, they worked with Joar Nango and collaborators to present Girjegumpi: The Sámi Architecture Library in the Nordic Pavilion at the 18th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Their first collaborative collection of essays, softspot, was published in 2021 (InOtherWords).