Bahar Noorizadeh

Noorizadeh’s work looks at the relationship between art and capitalism, and their entangled moral, social and organisational technologies. She studies economic history against the grain in hopes of excavating radical economic imaginaries: From values rooted in classical liberalism to the neoliberal turn, to esoteric theories of the market posed against cybernetic socialism, and the rise of the financialised era, marked by anticipatory techno-utopianism and speculative subjectivities. She observes these shifts in sites as small as everyday life practices and special economic zones, and as large as digital infrastructures and global cities.

Staging the tension between artistic imagination and financial speculation, Noorizadeh’s practice disseminates as video (sci-fi documentaries and video-game essays) writing (finance and weird fiction and theory) and socially-connected and collaborative practice. Multi-authorship is key to her work as she often engage in continuous and mutual worlding with musicians and performers, besides other video artists and writers. 

These ideas and questions are present, namely, in the project Weird Economies (W.E), located at www.weirdeconomies.com, which Noorizadeh has initiated in 2021. Emphasising the speculative dimension of social relations and its capture by the predatory finance regime, W.E serves as a journal––commissioning artist research writing and essays––programming space and social-experimental site for tracing imaginaries beyond finance. As part of its activities, W.E organises study groups, workshops, schools, and role playing games to rehearse alternative scenarios for social organisation.