We got under a destructive spell following the perpetual call for growth and efficiency of the market and its demands for profit, This left both ourselves and our environment exhausted by overexploitation and overconsumption. In theory, we understand the need to establish a new structure, to challenge the existing order and adress the global crisis. Yet the question remains: where do we begin to break the spell? In Europe, most of the traditions related to care, healing, magic and folk practices have been wiped out. Consequently, we have become deprived of a meaningful context for resetting our collective well-being. prompting us to confront the timeless question once again: What will our future look like?
To predict the future—both on a public and personal scale—has been a central pursuit since the dawn of humanity, leading to the development of various cultural techniques designed to navigate uncertainty. The most recent development in this quest is a machine- and calculation-based predictive system. But the mathematical foundation for such machine-driven predictions dates back to the 17th century, when the British insurance company Lloyd’s first employed predictive analytics to maximize profit. Machines, primarily designed to generate profit and consume vast amounts of resources, seem unlikely to serve the communal needs of healing, care, or the redistribution of wealth and resources. In fact, this machine-based system shares more in common with divination—and the claims of a deity—than one might initially realize.
Divination, in its most political dimension, can be viewed as a tool for guiding human action, a means of decision-making, based on something or someone perceived as „objective“—be it data or a divine entity. In contrast, fortune telling is the spiritual practice of predicting information about the future, which implies a less serious or formal setting, even one of popular culture. Here, the belief in occult forces behind the prediction is less prominent than the concept of suggestion—acting as a spiritual and practical advisory. Detergancy advocates for reintroducing and updating some magic of the popular kind, also known as folkwisdom, which has been lost as a powerful resource for resisting the logic of destructive exploitation, rather than allowing algorithms and machines to define our present and predict our consumption behaviors—ultimately making decisions for our future.
Detergancy is a training lesson of self-determined sense-making, where individuals develop, trust, and reclaim their own senses, reasoning, and interpretive skills. The work unfolds as a fortune-telling arrangement in which detergents of varying colors, textures, scents, and consistencies are poured onto the ground to form a fluid, cleansing oracle. The liquids are dispensed via pumps from various containers, directed through long hoses onto the floor, all remotely controlled by the artist’s phone.
This work suggests that we should playfully train ourselves to subvert exploitative systems—interrupting their very fabric—especially in everyday contexts. The best reaction to crisis is to develop a powerful imagination. Determine means „to set the terms by oneself,“ and, as its etymology reveals – dating back to the same time that Lloyd laid the foundation for profit prediction – it also means „to figure it out.“
