Dear colleagues,

On 27th April the Alternative Worlds Seminar will explore outer space  
and beyond. Please join us!

The seminar is free and open to all, but please email me at  
[log in to unmask] to reserve a seat.
I'd be grateful if you could forward this to others who might be  
interested in attending.

Hope to see you on the 27th!

Ricarda Vidal

NB Sorry for cross-posting!

Alternative Worlds: A retrospective of the last 111 years

Seminar in Visual Culture 2011

Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies, Room ST 274
(School of Advanced Study, Stewart House, 32 Russell Square, WC1B 5DN London)

Wednesday 27 April 2011, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Mark Pilkington, 'Flying Saucers are (almost) Real - Dreaming the  
future from 1716 to the present'
Ingo Cornils, 'Between Bauhaus and Bügeleisen: the iconic style of  
Raumpatrouille (1966)'
Rachel Steward, 'A Science Fiction of the Present'



Mark Pilkington, 'Flying Saucers are (almost) Real - Dreaming the  
future from 1716 to the present'

There's nothing extraterrestrial about flying saucers. Carl Jung's  
'visionary rumour' of technological mandalas swooping through our  
skies came close to reality several times during the 20th century, and  
was first dreamt up by the scientist and mystic Emmanuel Swedenborg as  
far back as 1716. In this illustrated presentation I'll outline a  
history of human attempts to create airborne harmony in the shape of  
the circle, and consider what our desire to take to the skies in  
glowing halos says about our relationship to the heavens above. From  
18th century Sweden to 21st century America, via Victorian England,  
Nazi Germany and the planet Mars - flying saucers are almost real.

Ingo Cornils, 'Between Bauhaus and Bügeleisen: the iconic style of  
Raumpatrouille (1966)'

The German television SF series Raumpatrouille (Space Patrol) has long  
gained cult status, in German-speaking countries it is celebrated on a  
par with the original Star Trek series broadcast in the same year.  
Much has been made of its underlying ideology by critics who saw in it  
an awkward melange of undigested Prussian and Nazi militarism and Cold  
War paranoia. Yet to the viewers, the series communicated very  
different messages: a vision of a world where mankind is able to deal  
with the frontiers of the time, be it between genders or between  
nation states. Its introductory voice-over, fondly remembered by many  
viewers, evokes a utopian future.  In this alternative world,  
individualism and conformism are at odds, as are the material contexts  
in which individuals express their needs. While nation states have  
been abolished, strict hierarchies remain in government and military.  
Individualism is suppressed even though insubordination saves the day  
in each episode. The visual style of the series is futuristic and  
functional, reflecting a collective desire at the time to escape the  
sense of claustrophobia pervading the post-war era and the 'no  
experiments' attitude of the conservative government. Heavy use of  
glass, metal, and extruded plastic suggest a conscious break with  
(conservative) tradition, a conscious link to Bauhaus clarity and an  
attempt to create transparency. Technology is the means by which  
unheard-of things are done, be it the ability to live at the bottom of  
the sea or the everyday task of travelling amongst the stars. Of  
particular interest in this paper will be the innovative solutions the  
series' set designers came up with. Their heavy use of cutting edge  
1960s design and technology to envision an alternative world, just  
months before the cultural revolution of 1967/68 changed the world for  
real, suggests a rare moment of confidence.



Rachel Steward, 'A Science Fiction of the Present'

Writing in 1629 of Somnium, "my Astronomy of the Moon or of the  
Celestial Phenomena as Seen from the Moon", a text regarded by many to  
be the first within the literary genre of Science Fiction, Johannes  
Kepler 'jests' that "it will provide the fare for us who are being  
chased off the earth as we travel or migrate to the moon" (Kepler  
1629). Kepler references the impact of the Catholic  
Counter-Reformation and in doing so points to the fact that, from its  
outset, a certain cultural or political contingency informed the  
'dream worlds' of Science Fiction. This trait re-emerges with a  
renewed urgency in some strands of contemporary Science Fiction,  
Werner Herzog's documentary fiction Wild Blue Yonder (2001), The  
Otolith Group's Otolith 1 (2003) and the activities of the Association  
of Autonomous Astronauts are case in point. The latter write that they  
'are not interested in going into space to be a vanguard of the coming  
revolution: the AAA means to institute a science fiction of the  
present that can above all be an instrument of conflictuality and  
radical antagonisms'. This paper will explore the ways in which  
certain contemporary science fictional 'dream worlds' are configured  
in direct relation to, as effective within, our post-astronautic  
present.



The Seminar in Visual Culture: Alternative Worlds

This series of seminars acts as a forum for practicing artists,  
researchers, curators, students, and others interested in visual  
culture who are invited to present, discuss and explore a given theme  
within the broad field of Visual Culture.

In an attempt to escape the doom and gloom of the economic crisis the  
theme for 2011 is 'Alternative Worlds'. The aim is to examine the  
dreams, plans and hopes, but also the nightmares and fears reflected  
in utopian thinking since 1900 in the Western hemisphere. What has  
become of all those possible worlds? How do they reflect their  
contemporary culture and society and what, if anything, do or can they  
mean for our present, or indeed, our future? What alternative worlds  
are engendered by our own times, by the world of 2011 itself? This is,  
hence not only a retrospective of past utopias and their after-lives  
but also an invitation to look towards our possible futures.

The seminar is free and open to all, but please email me at  
[log in to unmask] to reserve a seat.



Full Programme:
See website for all abstracts:  
http://igrs.sas.ac.uk/events/seminars/alternative-worlds.html

Wednesday 26 Jan. 2011, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Ricarda Vidal, Introduction to Alternative Worlds
Marjolaine Ryley, 'Growing up in the New Age'
Boukje Cnossen, 'The Alternative World of Michel Houellebecq'

Tuesday 22 Feb. 2011, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Maya Oppenheimer, Preserving Utopia
Parvati Nair, 'A different Light: Thinking the World otherwise through  
Sebastião Salgado's Genesis"

Wednesday 30 March 2011, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Sascha Pohflepp, 'The Golden Institute'
Susanne Kord, 'From the American Myth to the American Dream: Lone  
Legends and 'Family Values' as Alternative Worlds in Recent Hollywood  
Westerns'

Wednesday 27 April 2011, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Mark Pilkington, 'Flying Saucers are (almost) Real - Dreaming the  
future from 1716 to the present'
Ingo Cornils, 'Between Bauhaus and Bügeleisen: the iconic style of  
Raumpatrouille (1966)'
Rachel Steward, 'A Science Fiction of the Present'

Wednesday 25 May 2010, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Daniel García-Castellanos, 'Science and Myth of other possible Mediterraneans'
Ricarda Vidal, 'Atlantropa - 1927 to 2011'
Deborah Jaffé, 'Utopia - Clara Louisa Wells'

Wednesday 15 June, 6.30pm - 9.00pm

Patricia Silva McNeill, 'The last city of the future': perspectives on  
Brasília in literature, film and the media
Christopher Daley, 'The landscape is coded': J.G. Ballard's Early  
Fiction and Visual Culture
Elena Solomides, 'JG Ballard's High-Rise as a critique of modern living'



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