An antidote to our relationship with the material world—generally framed by a rationalist apprehension of reality—object*oriented*magic creates new superstitions that draw on vernacular folk beliefs, psycho-magic, witchcraft, alchemy, and astrological methods. Everyday objects become the ingredients for ritualistic assemblages and, in the process, become recharged with magic, mystery, and myth, revealing their inherent vibrancy.
Three recipes from the manual of object*oriented*magic are featured, offering guidance to the lost souls of the modern world as they confront familiar problems. *Divided They Fall* transposes a folk spell into the work environment, using office objects along with cats and dogs to disperse colleagues who are against you. A spell to increase the chance of mating, *Winds of Change & Weeds of Sex* directs the energy of sexual residues to the spellcaster with the help of common artifacts. *Delivering the Proof in the Policy of Truth* uses kitchen tools to expose hypocrites, peeling off their masks and feeding their skin back to them. By introducing a layer of irrationality, o*o*m suggests alternative narratives that go beyond normative human-object relations, reframing the meanings assigned to the things that occupy our environment.
Critical Cooking Show is a collaboration between e-flux Architecture and the Istanbul Design Biennial within the context of its fifth edition, Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one.
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