Radical media, politics and culture.

The Beach Beneath the Street Release Party NYC June 8

The Beach Beneath the Street Release Party NYC June 8
June 8 at 8PM @ Spoonbill & Sugartown 218 Bedford Ave., Brooklyn 11211

Over fifty years after the Situationist International appeared, its legacy continues to inspire activists, artists and theorists around the world. Such a legend has accrued to this movement that the story of the SI now demands to be told in a contemporaryvoice capable of putting it into the context of twenty-first-century struggles.

McKenzie Wark presents his new book The Beach Beneath the Street A Fresh Historyof the Situationist International(Verso, 2011) on Wednesday night, Admission is Free but Seating is Limited. For info please call or email sugar@spoonbillbooks.com!

McKenzie Wark delves into the Situationists’ unacknowledged diversity, revealing a world as rich in practice as it is in theory. Tracing the group’s development from the bohemian Paris of the ’50s to the explosive days of May ’68, Wark’s take on the Situationists is biographically and historically rich, presenting the group as an ensemble creation, rather than the brainchild and dominion of its most famous member, Guy Debord. Roaming through Europe and the lives of those who made up the movement-including Constant, Asger Jorn, Michèle Bernstein, Alex Trocchi and Jacqueline De Jong-Wark uncovers an international movement riven with conflicting passions.

Accessible to those who have only just discovered the Situationists and filled with new insights, The Beach Beneath the Street rereads the group’s history in the light of our contemporary experience of communications, architecture, and everyday life. The Situationists tried to escape the world of twentieth-century spectacle and failed in the attempt. Wark argues that they may still help us to escape the twenty-first century, while we still can …

McKenzie Wark is the author of A Hacker Manifesto,Gamer Theory, 50 Years of Recuperation of the Situationist International and The Beach Beneath the Street, among other books. He teaches at the New School for Social Research and Eugene Lang College in New York City.