Happy New Year! Gott Nytt År 2022!

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Hej everyone! Inspired by seeing all my friends’ online end of year recap posts, I decided to collect all I’ve done together in one place as well.

I’m going to begin in November 2020, as my Scansion in Psychoanalysis and Art: The Cut in Creation book came out then, and I was in such a daze from the shocking death of one of my closest life-long friends that I barely even registered the book launch. I have in mind to focus more on this work of mine in 2022, perhaps interview some of the living artists whose work I wrote about in the book, as I’d been working on concepts for this book for years and it is so wonderful and exciting that it is finally out in the world. Huge thanks to Kate Hawes at Routledge for her excitement when I first presented the idea for this book to her and support in the process of bringing it to fruition. It truly is a dream come true.

This year I put out 60 episodes of Rendering Unconscious Podcast! Quite a feat, especially considering we bought a house and moved over the summer, a process which took up quite a bit of time this year. Additionally, I went back through all the episodes to ensure that videos of each episode are available at YouTube, so that the transcript may be accessed. I’ve included a list of all the episodes released this year at the end of this newsletter.

I joined the teams at Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society (PCAS) and Global Centre for Advanced Studies (GCAS) this year. I'm a Book Review Editor at PCAS and a Senior Research Fellow at GCAS, teaching in their Certificate in Psychoanalysis and Philosophy Programmes.

Several books came out this year!

In January of 2021, Trapart Books released the first book using my collages as the illustrations! The Mega Golem: A Womanual for all Times and Spaces. This book collects the texts from Carl’s writings for The Mega Golem, as well as those by other contributors. If you aren’t aware of what The Mega Golem is (well of course pick up the book!) you can listen to Radio Mega Golem broadcasts to get the gist.

In the spring, my second book of cut-up poetry came out, this time with my collages included as well! The Pathways of the Heart (Trapart Books 2021) – a very personal work dedicated to all those we’ve lost during this pandemic period.

Then Trapart Books published Outsider Inpatient: Reflections on Art as Therapy which I co-edited with Elisabeth Punzi. This book was a long time in the making. It stems from an event Dr. Punzi organized at Lillhagen Hospital in Gothenburg in a space where psychiatric residents were encouraged to paint the walls of the hospital corridors. Includes contributions by Per Magnus Johansson, Val Denham, Carl Abrahamsson, and yours truly, among others.

Publishing took a bit of a hiatus over the summer as we moved from our apartment in the city to our new home in the countryside.

Once we settled into the new place, the first book Trapart published was It’s Magic Monday Every Day of the Week, a collection of essays, rituals and musings about our magical and creative practices, stemming from weekly Magic Monday posts at our Patreon. It’s been incredible to see the development, especially as we began these posts around the start of the pandemic so our creative and magical practices have been documented throughout this experience. And I must say it’s those very practices that sustain us.

I also had 5 albums come out this year! All creative collaborations:

First Follow my voice (For Hatshepsut) with aural artist Per Åhlund was released by Highbrow Lowlife in February. Available digitally at Bandcamp and also as a limited edition CD via Trapart Editions, which comes with original artwork by me.

Then Inner Underworld with Henrik Nordvargr Björkk, who we synchronistically reconnected with while house hunting in the spring. Available digitally from Highbrow Lowlife at Bandcamp.

And 3 collaborations with sonic mastermind Pete Murphy, all available digitally from Highbrow Lowlife at Bandcamp:

Conceive Ourselves

This is Voyeurism

The Cutting-up of Love and Language

Here you can see some videos created for songs from these albums:

"If I could just get clear" from Follow my voice (For Hatshepsut) by Vanessa Sinclair & Per Åhlund.

"Sleazy Scandals" from Inner Underworld by Vanessa Sinclair & Henrik Nordvargr Björkk.

"Situated in the Gap (For Derek Jarman)" from This is Voyeurism by Vanessa Sinclair & Pete Murphy.

“These Boots (Just Got A Brand New Pair)” from Conceive Ourselves by Vanessa Sinclair & Pete Murphy.

"Bisexual Expression” from The Cutting-up of Love and Language by Vanessa Sinclair & Pete Murphy.

A video collection of my cut-up films was also released from Trapart this year:
Vanessa Sinclair – Poetry In Emotion, Volume 1. You can see a trailer for the collection here.

Carl and I also created 3 episodes of our 23rd Mind TV show!

Episode 8 of 23rd Mind TV is here! First of all, thank you to all our patrons for making 23rd Mind TV possible! Carl just started a crowdfunder to support his An Art Apart film series and forthcoming book! “An Art Apart” – a series of documentary films about artists and their creative processes. So far, I’ve filmed 14 artists: Vicki Bennett (People Like Us), Gustaf Broms, Charles Gatewood, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Kenneth Anger, Carl Michael von Hausswolff, Angela Edwards, MV Carbon, John Duncan, Gea Philes, Michael Gira, Mark McCloud, Val Denham, and Little Annie Bandez

Episode 9 of 23rd Mind TV by and with Vanessa Sinclair & Carl Abrahamsson. “What are we working on right now, and how and why? Plus mentions of new work by our many friends, like Vicki Bennett, Susana Vico Valero, Henrik Björkk, Adel Souto, Andrew McLuhan, and more…” Many thanks to our Patreon patrons for making 23rd Mind TV possible! And gratitude to everyone who supported Carl’s AN ART APART – NUMBER ONE fundraising campaign. The book and film are in the works!

Episode 10 of 23rd Mind TV by and with Vanessa Sinclair & Carl Abrahamsson. “This is our first episode in our new house! Thank you all for your support. We are so appreciative! Here’s a little bit about what we’ve been up to and what are we working on now. Plus mentions of new work by our many friends, like Blanche Barton, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Mikita Brottman, Hannah Zeavin, Adel Souto, Axel Torvenius, Artemis, Annsofie Jonsson & more…”

This year we reignited our Psychoanalysis, Art & the Occult series! We now have an ongoing residency at Morbid Anatomy Museum, online with events every month.

We began September 5th with Artificial Intelligence and the Patipolitical Body with Dr. Isabel Millar, and Freud’s Explorations of the Occult with Dr. Vanessa Sinclair.

Then continued with Mary Wild on Taxidermy in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Discussion with Anna Biller, Writer and Director of The Love Witch & Viva on September 12th.

We then had The Two Antichrists with Peter Grey and Alkistis Dimech of Scarlet Imprint on September 19th.

Followed by Dancing in the Graveyard: Death Imagery in Satanism by Blanche Barton and Memento Mori Forever by Carl Abrahamsson on September 26th.

November 21st, we welcomed The Face of Fear: Faces in Gothic Horror Films with Icy Sedgwick and “How Weird is That?” with Dr. Kasper Opstrup

And rounded out the year with “Up, Up O Ye Gods!” – Hermeticism as a Path for Modern Seekers presented by Mitch Horowitz and “Secrecy Exposed!” – On the Necessity of Psychic Stigma and Dynamic Darkness in Occultism presented by Carl Abrahamsson on December 19th.

Next up, January 23rd we have The Psychic Violence of Alfred Hitchcock: Cutting in Vertigo, Psycho and The Birds presented by Dr. Todd McGowan and Roman Polanski’s Apartment Trilogy: Repulsion, Rosemary’s Baby and The Tenant presented by Mary Wild, live via zoom

This year I also gave a talk about my book Scansion in Psychoanalysis and Art: The Cut in Creation (Routledge, 2020) at Morbid Anatomy Museum, online, June 26th.

I also presented On Psychoanalysis and Violence: Contemporary Lacanian Perspectives (Routledge, 2018) with co-editor Dr. Manya Steinkoler at Reckoning/ Foresight, 40th annual conference of APA, Division 39, online, March 14th.

I presented my work on scansion, the cut-up method of Brion Gysin & William Burroughs, Pandrogeny and polymorphous perversity at Cast off! Lacan and the arts, Fondation de la Psychanalyse, Paris, online, October 9th.

And I presented “Embrace Your Own” on working with ancestors at Yule Hyggeasy 2021, online, December 11th.

As far as interviews, I was interviewed for the Artist + Analyst series curated by Dr. Julie Futrell.

Interviewed with Katelan Foisy on Pragmagick podcast, hosted by Keats Ross.

Interviewed by Andrew McLuhan of The McLuhan Institute for The Massage podcast.

Interviewed by Tom Bland for Spontaneous Poetics.

Interviewed by Mary Wild for her Patreon.

And Fevers of the Mind Quick-9 interview with Vanessa Sinclair

That appears to sum up 2021! There was much more than I expected when I embarked on this endeavor earlier today. As always, HUGE thanks to our Patreon patrons, friends, family, listeners, readers and collaborators for all of your support. Be sure to keep in touch via Patreon, Twitter and/or Instagram. Thank you for subscribing to my newsletter!

Skål to the New Year 2022!

Love Vanessa