Depressed or bored? How COVID-boredom intensifies the fear of missing out

 "Depressed or bored? How COVID-boredom intensifies the fear of missing out," in The Conversation, 7 February 2021

As the COVID-19 pandemic, restrictions and quarantines continues into their second year, more people are experiencing an acute form of COVID-boredom.

The Hypothetical

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 The Hypothetical (Metaflux, 2020)

These short texts--aphorisms, maxims, meditations, notes, fragments--function as little philosophical essays which at times verge into the poetic and the literary, in an exploration of non-singular existence. Positioning history as a consequence of experiencing 'self', Haladyn proposes the possibility of a hypothetical philosophy that is manifest in what may be called 189 theses on the self.

Duchamp, Aesthetics and Capitalism

 Duchamp, Aesthetics and Capitalism (Routledge, 2019)
This book is a significant re-thinking of Duchamp’s importance in the twenty-first century, taking seriously the readymade as a critical exploration of object-oriented relations under the conditions of consumer capitalism.

The readymade is understood as an act of accelerating art as a discourse, of pushing to the point of excess the philosophical precepts of modern aesthetics on which the notion of art in modernity is based. Julian Haladyn argues for an accelerated Duchamp that speaks to a contemporary condition of art within our era of globalized capitalist production.

Aganetha Dyck: The Power of the Small

Aganetha Dyck: The Power of the Small (Blue Medium Press 2016) 
This is the first major publication on the artistic practice of this important Canadian artist. This book considers the history of Dyck’s engagement with the small throughout her career as an artist, most prominently in her long-term collaboration with the bees. In addition to the main text, this publication includes “A Note on Other-Than-Human Beings” by Miriam Jordan-Haladyn, a collaborative essay on Dyck’s collaborative work with William Eakin and an extensive interview with the artist. This is the latest volume in the Canadian Artist Monograph Series (CAMS). Hardcover [full colour] / paperback [b/w], 204 pages.

Boredom Studies Reader

Boredom Studies Reader: Frameworks and Perspectives (Routledge, 2016)
Edited by Michael E. Gardiner and J. J. Haladyn
Boredom Studies is an increasingly rich and vital area of contemporary research that examines the experience of boredom as an important – even quintessential – condition of modern life. This anthology of newly commissioned essays focuses on the historical and theoretical potential of this modern condition, connecting boredom studies with parallel discourses such as affect theory and highlighting possible avenues of future research. Spanning sociology, history, art, philosophy and cultural studies, the book considers boredom as a mass response to the atrophy of experience characteristic of a highly mechanised and urbanised social life.

Boredom and Art - An Interview with Julian Jason Haladyn

Boredom and Art - An Interview with Julian Jason Haladyn

In this interview with Julian Jason Haladyn, we discuss his recent book "Boredom and Art - Passions of the Will to Boredom", in the process covering a range of issues, from how boredom emerges as distinctive to the modern and post-modern experience, and how inhabiting the space of boredom can represent an act of powerful subversion (with a tip of hat to Walter Benjamin). Also, we look at how the art of such as Edouard Manet, Marcel Duchamp, On Kawara, and Chantal Akerman draw us to engagement in that subversion.

Boredom and Art

Boredom and Art (Zero Books 2015) 
This book examines the use of boredom as a strategy in modern and contemporary art to resist or frustrate the effects of consumerism and capitalism. This book traces the emergence of what Haladyn terms the will to boredom in which artists, writers and philosophers actively attempt to use the lack of interest inherent in the state of being 'bored' to challenge people. Instead of accepting the prescribed meanings of life given to us by consumer or mass culture, boredom represents the possibility of creating meaning: ‘a threshold of great deeds’ in Walter Benjamin’s memorable wording. It is this conception of boredom as a positive experience of modern subjectivity that is the main critical position of Haladyn's study, in which he proposes that boredom is used by artists as a form of aesthetic resistance that, at its most positive, is the will to boredom.