Between Kitchen Semiotics and the Privatised Public: How is the Personal Political in Art Today

This keynote lecture for the Private Life conference, University of Edinburgh, June 2019) traces the equal and opposite motion between art that gives representation to private life, often working towards abolishing the distinction between art and life, and those political and economic forces that aim to enclose and norm the interior life of capitalist subjects. The lecture surveys different movements and moments from German Expressionism and the rise of National Socialism in Germany to contemporary immersive art projects and the perfection of data capitalism.