We are excited to announce that Nathaniel Sullivan will be conducting a seminar in the back of a limousine on October 20th! This public space project is happening at the same time as the Conflux Festival. Nathaniel has also been invited to talk about the project at the Barney Building the following afternoon. Stay tuned for more details. See below for the official seminar poster.
“All That You Desire: Get It All In An Era Of Low Density Hope “ is a seminar that will be conducted from the back of a limousine for approximately one hour on October 20th, 2012. Participants will be selected from the pool of visitors to the Conflux Festival. The limo will travel through lower Manhattan, the center of global capitalism. We will stop along the route- to tell stories, to play games and to immerse ourselves in the locations of unabashed desire. One of the things this environment teaches us (if we listen to it) is that the abstractions of the financial industry can also have a social function. Unmoored from our old moral codes by these abstractions, we are free to want, to get, and in turn, to want more.
From the artist:
ALL THAT YOU DESIRE: GET IT ALL IN AN ERA OF LOW DENSITY HOPE
What would happen if you got everything you wanted? What would you look like? What would you feel like?
Most people alive on the planet have done something only to say right after, “wow, that was stupid”. One way or another, we act in service of our desires, which often produce contradictory results. We are not always in control of what we want. So if we are not in control of our desires, then what can we control? If you guessed ‘how you feel about what you want’, then you guessed right.
“All That You Desire: Get It All In An Era Of Low Density Hope “ is a seminar that will be conducted from the back of a limousine for approximately one hour on October 20th, 2012. Participants will be selected at the Conflux Festival. The limo will travel through lower Manhattan, the center of global capitalism. We will stop along the route, to tell stories, to play games and to immerse ourselves in the locations of unabashed desire. One of the things this environment teaches us (if we listen to it) is that the abstractions of the financial industry can also have a social function. Unmoored from our old moral codes by these abstractions, we are free to want, to get, and in turn, to want more.
I know what you might be thinking at this point. “How do you resolve a limited amount of resources with an unlimited amount of desire”? Well, my first answer is anything worth having is in limited supply. But a more in depth answer is this: go into debt. It may sound crazy, but I believe that debt is an act of citizenship. It is time to reframe debt, to not see it as a burden, as we have in the past, but as the most important social bond that we can have with others.
But ultimately, this seminar is about you and what you want. You have been conditioned not to want too much. The well-worn narrative dictates that ruin awaits those who have everything they want. It is this belief that we must sever from your desires.
Think about this for a moment, NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) works on the conditioning of the mind, much like an athlete conditions her body. But an athlete can only jump so high or run so fast as her potential allows. On the other hand, the mind can create a whole universe, instantly. So what would happen if you used that power to imagine a world where you didn’t feel guilty for getting what you want?
So why am I doing this? I am doing it because I want your attention. Why am I doing this for free? Because I want your attention more than I want your money. And what I really want is for you to take this ride with me. I want you to get what you want, when you want it.
Space is limited, I would love to take you all, but I can only take a few. The first thing that you must do is attend the Conflux festival. The second thing is to be ready for change. I will be in a suit, accompanied by a photographer. I will be asking festival attendees important questions that will determine their suitability for the seminar. It will be an opportunity that will last an hour. And after that my friends, the opportunity will be gone.
-Nathaniel Sullivan 2012