How to praxis after the end of the world with more than so-called humans?

Abstract

This article is a meditation on the relations between praxis, art and posthumanism. Particularly, it is an attempt at a kind of practice of meaning-making that entangles multiple theoretical fields with my own critical creative practice. The article utilizes the feminist methodology of diffraction to read multiple frameworks through each other without privileging one over the other. It explores a speculative potential in relation to meaning-making and utilizes three specific examples of my artworks that examine what it means to practise concepts that perform change. These artworks – and the theoretical orientations I argue for – take a posthumanist view of media, crude oil, water and sheep. I call this work ‘Heliotechnics/Heliotechniques’: solar practices. These include my recent work Carbon Loops (2022), a dual 16-mm projection installation of crude oil film loops that were soaked in crude oil for one month; and a revisiting of the experimental videos Signal Works (2017) and grass wool signal scan (2016). I build a kind of relation to posthumanist practices through the feminist philosopher River (Karen) Barad. While I emphasize the artworks, it is the kinds of non-representational practices and concepts that I explore in this meditation. My goal is to think through words and doings to enact concepts that perform change.