What is left of a person when they no longer exist?
PHOTOGRAPH: In Øyvind Hjelmen's pictures we are forced to look inward. The suggestive is far more often present than the bombastic. In this book one can raise the question of how photographs can be communicated.
Man-made electromagnetic radiation
ENVIRONMENT: Rachel Carson raised world opinion about the effects of environmental toxins on nature and ecosystems. Now another environmental burden threatens – one we create on the path to the 'green shift'. Radiation is today an overarching stress factor that can contribute to the emergence of most of the chronic diseases we struggle with.
Pål Steigan: Entrepreneurship and Capitalism (film and text part II)
MODERN TIMES CONVERSATIONS: A few years ago, Pål Steigan restored an old dilapidated Capuchin monastery north of Rome – to run site development and seminars. When MODERN TIMES recently interviewed him, around 15 people had gathered there for a symposium, in the village of Tolfa. Steigan is clearly someone who never gives up. See the previous newspaper for the first part of the interview. Here we see in del to on his entrepreneurship, the online newspaper steigan.no and his criticism of capitalism.
What is at stake
ECOLOGY: This time, MODERN TIMES looks at a book that, in its breadth and depth, treats our time and future, ecologically as well as culturally – as when culture is naturalized. About India: Here the most meticulous rituals are performed to keep the world in balance. About China: the Chinese emperors who used music to harmonize society. In Europe's stormy history, the dream of harmony and order is projected into the afterlife. Erland Kiøsterud tries to find a cosmology that can create a certain order and meaning in the world, while at the same time demanding total honesty. (See also our film about Kiøsterud here).
Little Tel Aviv
REPORT: Ramallah is the city of power and business. You move through Ramallah's cafes: Sufi, which looks like Paris. Snowbar, for a cocktail by the pool. The revolving Sky Terrace on the 23rd floor of the Palestine Tower. Rukab ice cream parlor. Ensherah for journalists. Café de la Paix for smart business people, or Vintage, next to the municipal fountain, with its water show and the music from Titanic.
Gilles Deleuze and the control society
ESSAY: The French philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari are concerned with the multiplicities of the periphery or “minorities” and the possibilities for new mechanical productions. Since 1968, performance art, music, dance, theater, literature, and cinema have merged into multimedia lines of flight. But individuals are reduced to nodes in networks that are modulated through measured amounts of stimuli and responses (“broadcast yourself,” “like”). We analyze the significance of this in more detail.
Peace conference in Skåne from July 25 to 27
SECURITY: The Nordic Peace Alliance is working to ensure that the Nordic region becomes a nuclear-weapon-free zone. This year's conference in Skåne, Sweden in July will address topics such as Common Security and the legacy of the Helsinki Conference.
The Ghost of Nazism in Our Time
BORN: In his rewriting of the song "He's Dead, but He Won't Lie Down," Otto Nielsen took issue with what he saw as a revival of Adolf Hitler's ideas. 80 years after the victory over Nazism, the song's message is more relevant than ever. But no, the threat does not come from Russia.
"Everything for Norway"
WAR: Norway has – at one level or another – participated in all of the US and NATO wars since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. We also help remove leaders we believe some should not have. But what are we willing to die for?
A hegemonic world
RHETORIC: The so-called rules-based international order is not a set of internationally accepted specific rules – nor does it create order. With an imperialist mindset, there is now one set of rules for our allies and another for our enemies – between the countries called the civilized “garden” and the uncivilized “jungle”.
Female cartoonists
POLITICAL SATIRE: We watch the TV series that analyzes the courage of press cartoonists and the relevance of their work in the democratic struggle and in the defense of the rights of individuals and especially women.
Hate and collapse in the United States
RESISTANCE: We try to analyze President Trump as a late-capitalist fascist whose political program is based on racial exclusion, xenophobia, transphobia, misogyny and a vision of national rebirth. This in a country where more than 30 people are killed by firearms every year, an average of over 000 victims a day. But also: we see a return to political crime to suppress protests. This is the case everywhere today, but besides the US it is especially visible in Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Emirates and Iran.
The seduction of apocalyptic revelation
FUTURE: Political systems and new technologies have given us a sense that the promises of the future have faded. Would it be a tragedy if there were no more humans on the planet?
People want welfare, not war.
CULTURE OF PEACE: A culture of peace is not accepting the enemy images that are primarily created by the military-industrial complex – which is fully aware that if people are not afraid, they will not accept the crazy arms race we are in.
Deep ties revealed between the Israeli army and Microsoft
TECHNOLOGY/ISRAEL: Since October 7, 2023, the Israeli military has been making extensive use of cloud and AI services from Microsoft and its partner OpenAI, with the tech giant’s employees deployed to various units to support the deployment in Gaza, a joint investigation shows. Microsoft personnel work closely with units in the Israeli army to develop products and systems. From October 2023 to June 2024, the Israeli Ministry of Defense spent $10 million to purchase 19 hours of engineering support from Microsoft.
The cartography of genocide
ARCHITECTURE: Israeli Eyal Weizman is the founder and director of Forensic Architecture – a research group that uses architecture as an approach to investigating state violence and human rights violations. The group collaborates with artists, architects, researchers, lawyers and journalists – and sometimes with a court. Their main areas of work are Palestine and now Gaza.
The reconstruction of Gaza
LANYARD: We speak with Yahya Sarraj. Since 2019, he has had the least desirable job in the world: He is the mayor of Gaza City. In recent months, they have been preparing the plan “The Gaza Phoenix” for reconstruction – together with specialists not only from Palestine, but also from European, American and other Arab countries. A plan that was unanimously approved by all 25 municipalities in the Gaza Strip. “The Gaza Phoenix” is neither Hamas nor Fatah.
Thinking with the eyes
PROFILE: Chantal Akerman opens a cinematic space without demands for productivity. Her idiom is that of the auteur, where she has full artistic control over and ownership of the films. In her cinematic philosophy, time is a form where time seemingly stands still. And what does Christine Smallwood say about her work? MODERN TIMES has been on exhibition – and has read.
The fire that burns old worlds
ESSAY: In Europe, around 500 versions of the fairy tale Cinderella have been recorded. The film Cinderella is not only about being queer, but also about how identity is controlled. And hence what 'archive' one has at their disposal.
A militarized society
ISRAEL: The Center for Research Architecture, CRA, has developed a unique laboratory for forensic architecture with an interdisciplinary team of researchers, architects, academics, visual artists, and journalists. This is a new field of research where state violence and systemic racism are viewed with new scenarios.
The one we don't talk to...
MODERN TIMES CONVERSATION: We hear from Pål Steigan about his political background, upbringing and thinking. Also about the establishment of the newspaper Klassekampen, and his time in the AKP (ML) and Rødt parties. He is contrarian and censored in Norway when it comes to many issues. We have chosen to let him speak with his own arguments, where we meet him in Italy at the Franciscan monastery he has furnished as a writing room and seminar venue.
Independent journalism
MEDIA: To uncover something about the independent media in Turkey, I visited P24, at the literature house for culture and political debate – in the heart of Istanbul.