{"id":85058,"date":"2015-04-22T17:44:45","date_gmt":"2015-04-22T21:44:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=85058"},"modified":"2015-04-23T13:02:47","modified_gmt":"2015-04-23T17:02:47","slug":"posthuman-utopia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/04\/22\/posthuman-utopia\/","title":{"rendered":"Posthuman Utopia"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"lori<\/a>

Lori Nix, Mall<\/i>, 2010.<\/p><\/div>\n

Earth: it\u2019s a neat-looking place.<\/p>\n

Ag\u00e8d. Spherical. Cerulean-ish.<\/p>\n

Problem is, there are more than seven billion people here, gumming up the planetary works with such \u201cadvances\u201d as \u201cbuildings,\u201d \u201cindoor plumbing,\u201d and \u201crust-proof tension-mounted shower caddies.\u201d Earth is so crowded with human beings that many of them live and work within mere feet of one another. It is, on Earth Day, something of a buzzkill. <\/p>\n

Praise be to Lori Nix\u2019s dioramas<\/a>, then, for showing us how much better the world will be when humanity\u2014that most entrenched of fads\u2014passes, leaving our edifices to crumble under the forces of nature. Nix, whose work we\u2019ve featured on the Daily<\/em> before<\/a>, takes at least seven months in building each of her small-scale constructions, most of which depict everyday institutions (art museums, laundromats, subways, bars, libraries) bereft of people and besieged by new growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to do scenes with lots of people where it implies mass death,\u201d she told Newsweek<\/em><\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s like being in New York City and people disappear overnight … People were in the middle of their activities, and poof. I don\u2019t know why they\u2019re gone. That\u2019s for you to figure out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her work will appear alongside other, similarly apocalyptic artists\u2019 in \u201cPost Human Utopia<\/a>,\u201d a show opening today at the Lodge Gallery.<\/p>\n

\"22\"<\/a>

Vacuum Showroom<\/i>, 2006.<\/p><\/div>

\"07\"<\/a>

Subway<\/i>, 2012.<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n

Dan Piepenbring is the web editor of <\/em>The Paris Review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Earth: it\u2019s a neat-looking place. Ag\u00e8d. Spherical. Cerulean-ish. Problem is, there are more than seven billion people here, gumming up the planetary works with such \u201cadvances\u201d as \u201cbuildings,\u201d \u201cindoor plumbing,\u201d and \u201crust-proof tension-mounted shower caddies.\u201d Earth is so crowded with human beings that many of them live and work within mere feet of one another. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2384],"tags":[35,5931,14245,17874,17875,2798,8148,125,13662,17876,17877,607],"class_list":["post-85058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-look","tag-art","tag-cities","tag-dioramas","tag-earth","tag-earth-day","tag-lori-nix","tag-miniatures","tag-new-york-city","tag-people","tag-post-apocalypse","tag-shopping-mall","tag-subway"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLori Nix\u2019s Dioramas Present Post-Mankind Urban Landscapes<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Brooklyn-based artist takes some seven months in constructing the pieces.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/04\/22\/posthuman-utopia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Posthuman Utopia by Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"April 22, 2015 \u2013 Earth: it\u2019s a neat-looking place. 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