The New Space

While we love the physical and graphic side of magazines, our Close-up strand reminds us of the importance of the stories that magazines tell. The latest example comes from artist/designer Scott King’s new manifesto project.

Following his 2021 The Debrist Manifesto, The New Space takes a similar visual route (Futura Bold Condensed in B&W) to tell the story, in first person, of a ficticious lone culture worker’s campaign against the entire culture industry (AKA ‘Space Control’) armed only with social media. Like all great stories it is at once funny and tragic, the subtle blend of genuine communication strategy language and brutal parody pulling the reader every which way.

Does Scott know people like his protagonist? ‘I don’t know anybody who isn’t—at least to some degree. I’ve already had quite a few messages from people who’ve read it, all of them—essentially—saying the same thing, “this book just describes my life” ... I think we all dream of The New Space, don’t we?’

Scott explains more; ‘The New Space begins where The Debrist Manifesto ends, in a way. The protagonist in The Debrist Manifesto concludes that ‘if there is no desire to compete, to seek out Their Space—or—even to make an idea concrete; then there is no need to finish anything—therefore the Debrist is free to do what they have always done: think up ideas for exhibitions that will never get made, write half-theatre plays and come up with great titles for novels that will never be written. The difference is: the protagonist in The New Space DOES want to engage with Their Space, in fact he is desperate to triumph within Their Space—he just does not have the means to do so; and this is his great problem.

‘But, The New Space also pre-dates The Debrist Manifesto by many years. A great friend of mine—Nicky Holliday—very sadly died when we were in our early twenties, and Nicky’s mum gave me a book that had belonged to Nicky; a book he’d bought while at college: ‘The Poetics of Space’, by Gaston Bachelard... my copy of the book has a letter to me from Nicky’s mum, folded-up inside it. For years I’ve been promising myself that I'd do something about this particular copy of this particular book... and I think The New Space is it.’

Over to The New Space…

I TRY TO IMAGINE A LIFE OF JOY AND FREEDOM WITHOUT THEIR SPACE: “PERHAPS I COULD LIVE IN A FIELD, OR BY THE SEA?”

I spend a huge amount of time on my handset—looking up ‘property for sale’: fisherman’s cottages on isolated cliff-tops; remote farmhouses on far-away hillsides.

“If I sold my flat in the city, I couldn’t afford much—but, I could afford a small place in the middle of nowhere.”

“Then I would be free from my desire to accumulate Their Space… I could get a dog, I could write all day; I could, at last, find peace—but what would I do for money?”

IT IS THE ‘MONEY QUESTION’ THAT ALWAYS LEADS THIS PARTICULAR FANTASY TOWARDS THE SAME CONCLUSION:

“If I bought a fisherman’s cottage or a remote farmhouse, I wouldn’t have any money left—and without my pursuit of Their Space, I would have no income—BUT—if I sold my flat and bought a caravan in a field… that would cost almost nothing.”

I dwell on this thought for some time, imagining myself living all-year-round in an old, damp caravan, with only a microwave oven for company: a harsh and lonely life—BUT—with plenty of money in the bank – I would, at least, be free. 

THOUGH—INEVITABLY—REALITY DAWNS:

“I can’t REALLY move to a caravan in a field—because—if I did make a Total Retreat, and genuinely wanted to be FREE, I’d have to get rid of my handset—and the internet—or I’d spend all day looking up my peers on the app.”

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I dedicate several hours of each day to the app – and – because I spend so much time on it – I have become something of an expert on the psychology of my fellow culture workers; noting their patterns of behaviour:

The culture worker who is Space Positive always has something that they cannot wait to ‘share’ – and they clog up your ‘feed’ with endless New Information [NEW(S)] about their latest Spatial Triumph(s):

- ‘I just made The New York Times best-seller list!’
- ‘Happening right now! My collab with @dior’
- ‘Having sushi with Patti!’ (Smith)

WHILE: 

The culture worker who is Space Negative—and therefore has no New Information—or any kind of NEW(S) that could generate even a modicum of excitement—might still clog up your feed—but never with anything that could be mistaken for a Spatial Triumph:

- ‘Just made a baked potato, delicious with cheese!’
- ‘New work!’ (in a hospital corridor) 
- ‘Am looking at Sea Kale in Derek Jarman’s garden’

AND

It is only the more discerning of these Space Negative culture workers: 

 Who are able to admit to themselves that they have: NO NEW(S)

That do not clog up your feed, reasoning—quite rightly—that with ‘nothing to report’, there is very little point in ‘sharing’ anything.

But, of course, ‘not sharing anything’ creates a problem in itself—because—the culture worker who is not permanently present is soon forgotten, and easily rendered INVISIBLE.

Text Scott King
Design Scott King & Francisca Monteiro

scottking.co.uk