Beyond Gobbledegook: Alchemy, Biopunk And Witchcraft

We’ve long been interested in the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic, and if this Cornish venue didn’t take longer to get to than a trip to Australia, we’d probably be regular visitors. It looks fun. But the latest press release from the Museum has left us scratching our heads at the sheer levels of pretentiousness on display. Let me explain.

The PR states that the Museum has invited WhiteFeather Hunter to curate its 2024 exhibition Arcanum Sanguinis, which begins on April 1st. You may or may not be familiar with Dr Hunter, but for those of you who are not, we are told that she is “A Canadian technofeminist transdisciplinary artist and scholar”, a description that may raise your eyebrows as much as it did ours. Hunter has a PhD in Biological Art, which involves “research in tissue engineering and laboratory magic using human stem cells derived from taboo body materials—all within the context of contemporary feminist witchcraft.” Well.

Now look, we’re all in favour of eccentric nonsense and have nothing against witches (indeed, some of our best friends are…) or even academics (because some of our other best friends are…) but this all sounds like gibberish that only people who take themselves rather too seriously could come up with. A pity, as there do seem to be some genuinely interesting elements once you get past the word salad. Well, maybe not all the way past. The blurb continues:

For Arcanum Sanguinis, Hunter’s curation of museum objects and artefacts that accompany her work speak to the symbolism, beliefs and practices that have underpinned the development of the discipline of biomedicine over the centuries. Though ‘magic’ and ‘science’ are often imagined to be opposing realms, Hunter has arranged a visual thematic narrative to show some of the subtle overlaps that exist between them, purposing the coalescence of material in unexpected ways.

Hunter’s machine embroidered and blood-stained lab coat complements a hand-embroidered ritual robe that features a caduceus symbol. The caduceus, a double-snake helical arrangement around a staff originates from ancient fertility goddess worship but is now best known for its association with medical institutions.

Considerable attention has been given to the proven parallels between art and magical practice, to the extent that they may in fact seem quite commonplace. Little attention has been awarded to the correspondences betwixt scientific practice and magic. In the instances that they exist, they are considered to be taboo …by The Academy.

Full marks for the inclusion of ‘betwixt’ there.

Now look, we’re being deliberately snarky here, but once we work past all this pseudo-academic guff, we’re left with an examination of the connections between medicine and magic, witchcraft and science. Not, in fact, all that groundbreaking a connection for anyone to make, but nevertheless, one that might be worthy of a curated exploration. But honestly, one of the things that continually irks me about museums and art galleries is the constant desire to obfuscate. There is no call for academic writing outside academia; indeed, we might be better off without it in academia. PhD papers would often be a lot more persuasive if they weren’t forced to adhere to the requirements of the form and instead allowed for genuine original thought without the need for formality, references and quotations. The spread of academic criticism into ‘mainstream’ culture has been depressing. I’m all for marginalised subjects being taken seriously and subject to intelligent criticism, but all too often, the dry academic form is an unnecessary level of pomposity that is all about telling people how much smarter you are than them – a form of audience alienation that feels both pretentious and elitist, especially when so many academics ultimately don’t even know what they are talking about (I’m focusing on film criticism here, but I imagine that it spreads to all disciplines).

We still encourage you to check out the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic’s exhibition though.

DAVID FLINT

Image © WhiteFeather Hunter

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