Contingent Agencies – Inquiring into the Emergence of Atmospheres

How do atmospheres – those subtle, impermanent, non-objectified and surrounding yet intimately affective presences – come to be? What forces enable and constrain their appearance, and how do they relate to one another? How to research these complex processes in a non-reductive way?

Contingent Agencies, an artistic research project initiated by Alex Arteaga and Nikolaus Gansterer, explores the dynamic relationship between human and non-human agencies as enabling conditions for the emergence of atmospheres. This cross-disciplinary investigation is conducted through multimodal practices of notation, reflection, showing, and sharing realized in diverse media within different theoretical frameworks such as phenomenology, enactivism, and new materialism. The present book, complemented by an extensive online archive, features multiple research artifacts – including texts, drawings, photo series, diagrams, sound recordings, and video stills – as an invitation for a wider community to join the inquiry.

With contributions by Alex Arteaga, Karen Barad, Arno Böhler, Emma Cocker, Alexander Damianisch, Gerhard Dirmoser, Mika Elo, Nikolaus Gansterer, Sabina Holzer, Tim Ingold, Paula Kramer, Erin Manning, Dieter Mersch, Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Leena Rouhiainen, and Andreas Spiegl.


Alex Arteaga, Helsinki University of the Arts
Nikolaus Gansterer, Department of Transmedia Art, Department of Art and Communication Practice, and APL – Angewandte Performance Lab, University of Applied Arts Vienna