During my recent chat with Scott Newman on the 27 Rouge podcast, I rambled my way into a concept that now I can’t get out of my head. Artisanal simulacra. Basically everything we encounter in modern life is simulacra: copies of things that no longer have an original. Living in a world saturated with simulacra amounts to living in
I think your observation is on point. I just moved from Los Angeles to a smaller, mellower, suburban South Carolina and I see the complete fake dullness. I'm fortunate to have picked a place with a lot of local culture and history so there's a decent amount of stuff you would find in the bigger cities real close, but the fakeness of everything can be oppressive, especially returning from a recent trip to Europe. I've come to the same conclusion that you have to embrace the artisanal fakeness. I try to eat at local places and make my own culture by hosting dinners, parties, and patronizing interesting stores.
not very much help, but i think whenever the idea of 'walks in nature' gets invented (e.g., by plato, by wordsworth, by everyone (now)) it's exactly then that nature has become a representation of itself. but perhaps nature being a representation of itself is better than a representation being a representation of itself.
Artisanal Simulacra: A Better Kind of Hyperreality
I think your observation is on point. I just moved from Los Angeles to a smaller, mellower, suburban South Carolina and I see the complete fake dullness. I'm fortunate to have picked a place with a lot of local culture and history so there's a decent amount of stuff you would find in the bigger cities real close, but the fakeness of everything can be oppressive, especially returning from a recent trip to Europe. I've come to the same conclusion that you have to embrace the artisanal fakeness. I try to eat at local places and make my own culture by hosting dinners, parties, and patronizing interesting stores.
not very much help, but i think whenever the idea of 'walks in nature' gets invented (e.g., by plato, by wordsworth, by everyone (now)) it's exactly then that nature has become a representation of itself. but perhaps nature being a representation of itself is better than a representation being a representation of itself.