"Solving our ecological crises means diluting the power of global corporations, not propping them up"

To truly flourish, the circular economy needs to be part of a bigger effort to tackle economic growth, wasteful consumerism and undemocratic power structures in the global economy. It needs to be geared to the real needs of all people rather than the excessive consumption of a few, and to be underpinned by more cooperative mechanisms rather than controlled by a small number of powerful companies.

On Guardian Sustainable Business, by Micha Narberhaus and Joséphine von Mitschke-Collande. Read the full article, or read further.

The Woman Who Married a Cabinet

Frustrated with how material objects were being treated around her, Yvonne Dröge Wendel, an artist and at the time student at the Rietveld Academie, embarked on a quest to question and rethink how we relate to the material entities we interact with in our everyday lives, that still lasts today.

The project in focus here is the one Yvonne developed for her graduation in 1992. Taking her ideas to the extreme as a form of illustration, she committed to a lifelong marriage with a Wendel cabinet, with which she spent an enviable honeymoon in the south-east of Portugal.

See some photos of the ceremony in the artist's website, and read a full interview with Yvonne Dröge Wendel in issue nº5 of MacGuffin Magazine.

Film: A Plastic Ocean

A Plastic Ocean film poster — Read more on the film and find out how you can watch it here.

The immense side effects of our lack of material respect are becoming all too familiar as we roam down this devastating path of mindless consumerism. Some of the most obvious instances of that are in our oceans; in the synthetic continents of disposed, rarely used more than once, bits and pieces of undead plastic.

A Plastic Ocean, directed by Australian journalist Craig Leeson in 2016, tries at portraying this alarmingly recent reality in an inquiry into the requirements of human development.

How to Go Anist

Being an Anist

Becoming an anist can be outlined in three different stages:

a. Consciously noticing and understanding the material entities that surround you – the objects you own, the ones you interact with in your daily life, etc.
b. Learning to discern an aura within those objects. This is something that might derive from self-reflection: what is it that makes you respect and value them, where does their worth come from?
c. Employing this aura to augment material entities, generally, amplifying their significance and their lives.

Practical Examples

Here's one: Click on the link in the next sentence to read some examples.
Read a new example.

Meet Other Anists

Find other people who are interested in material respect and try to further anism in one of our street campaigns:

No anist events are currently scheduled. You can organize your own.

We're Glad You Are Here.
You Can Help Us Build Anism

In the core of anism lies a community of people with similar concerns and a strong belief that we can still reverse the environmental conjuncture we're living under. If you came to this page with a purpose, we'd appreciate your help dearly.

Our community is open to anyone willing to devote time and effort to diffusing our beliefs and developing this movement. There are a few ways you could do so, scroll futher if you think you'd like to know more.

Get Involved with Your Local Anist Community

Active Communities

Glasgow, UK Contact
Aveiro, PT Contact

Can't see your location? You can start a local community and add it to the table.

Run Your Own Anist Actions

Anism is more effective when you adapt it to your context.

To help us do that, you can run your own anist actions.
We usually set up tables at flea markets or car boot sales, but you're the one who knows the area you live in; you decide how our beliefs will be best communicated there.

Here are some suggestions, some methods members of the community have been using:

Make the Symbol Your Own

Material, colour or surface 1.

Surface, colour or material 2.

The shape's proportions aren't fixed either, as you'll notice if you resize your browser window.
All that matters is that the shape inside is a box, the one outside has rounded edges, and that there is a distinction between the two different surfaces.

You can also take a look at how some other anists have appropriated it, in case you need inspiration:

Communicate Anism in a Tangible Way

Both because anism comes from a complex set of ideas and because it's very subjective in nature, communicating it quickly can be challenging.
To help you do it, our community (and by now you should consider yourself a part of it) is on an ongoing quest to create engaging tools that help people start reflecting on our ideals.
Bellow you'll find some of those, and you can add more to the website in case you develop your own and think they're worth sharing.

[THIS PART OF THE WEBSITE IS INCOMPLETE.]

The History of Anism

Introduction

Féticheurs Abomey, 1912 — By François-Edmond Fortier [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Anism is a new movement, but its ideals have been around for a long while. They were inherent to the beliefs and mythologies that guided the indigenous peoples that populated the lands we now inhabit. In fact, they were included in some of the patterns most commonly found by the Anthropologists who coined them under the term 'animism'.

Animism

Animism, in its own rights, is one of Anthropology's earliest concepts, as conceived by Sir Edward Tylor, the creator of its currently accepted definition.
It can be described as the belief that all material entities possess a 'distinct spiritual essence'. That the division between physical and spiritual is tenuous, all substantial matter requiring an equivalent degree of respect and consideration.

Anism

Anism, on its turn, is the urbanised cousin of animism. It's a movement that presupposes action for the change of behaviour and mentalities in a time in which disposability is the norm and materiality has lost the amplitude of its meaning in our lives.

Anist Manifesto

The myths that founded our societies are outdated, the uncertainty they tried to enlighten is no longer of considerable relevance. We now, more than ever, need new foundational allegories that can help us confront the perils of unsustainability.
What anism proposes is that we take from the ideals of animism and apply them to our individualities and our time. That we look after and enlarge the auras – the value and integrity – of the material goods which comprise our lives: that we build on their histories, on their idiosyncrasies; that we know when to let go of them respectfully, always making sure the aura is leastwise maintained, never diminished and never lost.

Disclaimer. This website and its contents are part of a prospective design project developed by João Monge Coutinho while exchanging at Glasgow School of Art during the 2017/2018 academic session.