Velkommen til eit møte med forfattar og professor i media- og kulturstudiar, McKenzie Wark, og til eit djupdykk i publikasjonane hennar “Raving” og “Deserters’ Dance”.Wark skriv sjølv:
Det eg elskar å skrive – og å undervise i – er måtar å tenkje kritisk om liva på, slik vi kan oppfatte og forstå samtida gjennom media og kultur. Dersom vi kan utruste oss med omgrep som skaper ein viss avstand til dei altfor velkjende medieboblene våre, kan vi finne vegar mot å forme betre liv – kvar for oss og saman.
Ved sidan av dei faste kursa mine i digitale medium har eg i det siste skrive og undervist mykje innan transstudium. Eg har òg nyleg fullført ei bok om den skeive og trans rave-scenen i New York, der eg tek opp att ein gammal interesse for studiet av natteliv og subkulturar. Eg likar å halde meg nysgjerrig, og har for vane å flytte forskings- og skriveinteressene mine over på nye tema kvart par år – så kanskje eg kastar meg over noko heilt anna snart.
McKenzie Wark (fødd 1961 i Australia) er professor i medie- og kulturstudium, og tidlegare programleiar for kjønnsstudium (hausten 2023) ved The New School i New York, i tillegg til å vere forfattar. Mellom publikasjonane hennar finn vi mellom andre: “Raving” (2023); “Philosophy for Spiders: On the Low Theory of Kathy Acker” (2021); “Sensoria” (2020); “I'm Very into You: Correspondence 1995–1996” (med Kathy Acker) (2015); “Capital is Dead” (2019); “Molecular Red: Theory of the Anthropocene” (2015); “Telesthesia: Communication, Culture & Class” (2012); “The Beach Beneath the Street: The Everyday Life and Glorious Times of the Situationist International” (2011); “Gamer Theory” (2007) og “A Hacker Manifesto” (2004).
I november/desember 2024 skreiv ho “Deserters’ Dance” for Karmaklubb*, i samarbeid med PRAKSIS og Dilettante Army.
SPRÅK Engelsk
ARRANGERT AV Karmaklubb* i samarbeid med ONLY SLIME og Det Norske Teatret.
Talk with McKenzie Wark:
Raves as spaces of resilience and transcendence
We want to warmly welcome you to this afternoon session of thought and pleasure with McKenzie Wark. The agenda: A dive into ‘Raving’ (Duke University Press, 2023) and the recently published ‘Deserters’ Dance’ (Karmaklubb*, PRAKSIS, and Dilettante Army, 2024) that reflects further on raves as spaces of resilience and transcendence.
About ‘Raving’: “What is an art of life for what feels like the end of a world? In Raving McKenzie Wark takes readers into the undisclosed locations of New York’s thriving underground queer and trans rave scene. Techno, first and always a Black music, invites fresh sonic and temporal possibilities for this era of diminishing futures. Raving to techno is an art and a technique at which queer and trans bodies might be particularly adept but which is for anyone who lets the beat seduce them. Extending the rave’s sensations, situations, fog, lasers, drugs, and pounding sound systems onto the page, Wark invokes a trans practice of raving as a timely aesthetic for dancing in the ruins of this collapsing capital.”
This event is in sweet collaboration with artists duo ONLY SLIME and Det Norske Teatret.
LANGUAGE English
Karmaklubb Since 2018, Karmaklubb* has organized several international discursive events, screenings, artist presentations, facilitated artistic and theoretical research as well as published texts focusing on spaces—physically, virtual, hybrid—that allows senses of freedom; where hierarchies dissolve and categories vanish, for something else to form. There are many keys: Art can be one, clubbing too, or writing. Our first encounter was with American artist Tony Cokes’ video work ‘Mikrohaus, or the black atlantic?’ (2018), while one of the most recent outcomes: a week-long festival with Australian thinker and writer McKenzie Wark, taking place at Trekanten, Det Norske Teatret, and MUNCH, followed by a celebration at Black Box teater, Oslo.
During this week, books by Wark will be available at Tronsmo bøker og tegneserier, Universitetsgata 12, Oslo.
Acknowledgements This series of events has been made possible through the collaboration with McKenzie Wark; PRAKSIS; Anders Dunker and Existenz Forlag, Oslo; ONLY SLIME and Det Norske Teatret; MUNCH and MUNCH Triennale 2025: Almost Unreal; Trekanten, Oslo; Black Box teater, Oslo; Tronsmo bøker & tegneserier, Oslo, and all Partners and Artists involved in the individual events. We are grateful for the support from Arts and Culture Norway (Kulturdirektoratet); Agency for Cultural Affairs, City of Oslo (Kulturetaten, Oslo kommune); The Royal Norwegian Consulate General, New York, NY, USA / The Ministry of Foreign Affairs; The Fritt Ord Foundation / Stiftelsen Fritt Ord; MUNCH, Oslo, and Det Norske Teatret, Oslo.
McKenzie Wark: “What I love to write, and to teach, is ways to think critically about contemporary life, as we can perceive and understand it via its media and culture. If we can equip ourselves with concepts that create some distance from our all-too familiar media bubbles, we can find our way towards crafting better lives, singly and together. Alongside my regular courses in digital media, I've lately been writing and teaching a lot in transgender studies. I’ve also just fineished a book about the queer and trans rave scene in New York, reviving an old interest in the study of nightlife and subcultures. I like to stay curious, and tend to move my research and writing interests on to different topics every few years — so maybe I’ll be looking into something else again soon.”
Wark (born 1961 in Australia), is a Professor of Media and Cultural Studies and formerly Program Director, Gender Studies (fall 2023) at The New School, New York and a writer. Among several notable publications, are (selection): ‘Raving’ (2023); ‘Philosophy for Spiders: on the low theory of Kathy Acker’ (2021); ‘Sensoria’ (2020); ‘I'm Very into You: Correspondence 1995–1996’ (with Kathy Acker) (2015); ‘Capital is Dead’ (2019); ‘Molecular Red: Theory of the Anthropocene’ (2015); ‘Telesthesia: Communication, Culture & Class’ (2012); ‘The Beach Beneath the Street: The Everyday Like’ and ‘Glorious Times of the Situationist International’ (2011); ‘Gamer Theory’ (2007), and ‘A Hacker Manifesto’ (2004).
November/December 2024, she wrote ‘Deserters’ Dance’ for Karmaklubb*, co-published with PRAKSIS and Dilettante Army.
Karmaklubb* is an autonomous nomadic queer platform for critical reflection, and celebration. An ever-morphing space for queer visibility, celebration, and joy. Besides club evenings and nights, the programme consists of open conversations, curatorial work, screenings, artist talks, film production, panels, concerts, performance art, Drag, wine tastings, ale, and sometimes food. Things that are nice for the whole being. Since 2018 Karmaklubb* has realised more than 350 projects, among them hosted events of various sorts in addition to launching an extensive number of other projects on- and offline. Karmaklubb* is also a publishing and research platform, the IGWTLI publishing (established in 2018), that exists as essays, letters and gifts, transcripts, experimental written encounters, in addition to listening sets, podcasts, and an archive of ‘thought & pleasure’—and new forms constantly to be explored. Critical reflections as well as pure joi (sic), anchored in the Karmaklubb* ever morphing and transcending practice with people being part of the travel. Partners and collaborators include museums, artist driven initiatives, print houses, publishers, a wide range of organisations and individuals working within the fields of arts and culture, rights and freedom of speech, as well as gastronomy and nightlife—in Norway and internationally.
ONLY SLIME is a shapeshifting artists duo founded in Oslo by Claudia Cox and Tobi Pfeil—fusing theatre, opera, digital art, and immersive technology into high-impact, genre-fluid works. Since their explosive debut, they’ve premiered internationally acclaimed productions like ‘Afterlife’ (winner of Norwegian Composers Association ‘work of the year’ in 2025), and developed a bold signature aesthetic that blends live motion capture, autotuned opera, electronica, black metal, and game imagined worlds. Touring across Europe and the America, they build hybrid performance landscapes where avatars glitch, forests burn, and queer mythologies take root. For them, slime is both a symbol and a strategy: elastic, emotional, radically adaptive. Their work dissolves the boundaries between ritual and rave, body and screen—inventing a new theatrical language for a world in flux. ONLY SLIME is currently (2025) in residence at Det Norske Teatret.
Det Norske Teatret / The Norwegian Theatre is the largest theatre in Norway with an over 100 year long tradition. Its repertoire varies from musicals to new interpretations of Norwegian and European classics, and new Norwegian and international drama. It is sited in the capital Oslo in a large, modern building with four stages, and one satellite stage in another part of Oslo; Rommen. The theatre have approximately 20 new productions each year, and an audience of over 260,000. Over the years, the theatre has developed into a living house of culture, with poetry readings, concerts, various art exhibitions, children’s activities, workshops and much more.
Photo by Z Walsh. Courtesy of McKenzie Wark.
Event Venue
Kristian IV’s gt.8, 0164 Oslo, Norway, Kristian IV's gate 8, 0164 Oslo, Norge, Oslo, Norway
Tickets
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.
