Suspension of Disbelief
Objects have a tremendous importance in our lives. They are not only useful; they mean something to us. Sometimes we are sentimentally attached to them, we involve them in daily rituals or superstitiously hold on to them. Sometimes they can trigger physical attraction. There are many examples of paraphilias involving objects. Nowadays more liberal mores and the Internet makes it possible for practitioners of a specific fetish to form true communities. Thus you’ll find strong communities of balloon fetishists or people in love with buildings.
Consumerism is another form of object fetishism. Marketers create a mystique around their products to trigger our irrational consumption. We buy specific commodities or brands to show ourselves and others that we belong to a specific community based on social class or other cultural references. We basically build our identity through objects.
Observing these phenomena we have concluded that our relationship to objects involves faith. Objects carry stories and in order for them to “work” we need to believe in them. From there we decided to go one step further: for our MDP Summer Research Residency we will instigate a new cult based on the worship of objects. We will produce shrines, icons, altars, merchandising items and more technological and interactive machines, which will be needed to accomplish peculiar rituals.
