Picture Yourself in a Burning Building

Artist Scott Treleaven has created an expansive body of visual art, short films, and writing examining occult symbology’s furtive effect on modernism, counterculture, queerness, and its perpetual resurgence in contemporary art. Treleaven will present his autobiographical essay ‘Picture Yourself in a Burning Building’, illustrated with images from his work over the past 20 years. Touching on phenomenology, anarchism, AIDS, Buddhist psychology, and 90s queer zine culture, he questions whether or not - in an era of precarious irrationality - it might be time to put some old ghosts to rest. This lecture was first presented at the Occult Humanities Conference in New York in 2016, and as part of the ‘Design Misfits’ curriculum at Parsons, Paris.

Scott Treleaven (born Canada, 1972) is a painter and filmmaker. His influential 90s underground publications are included in the book ‘In Numbers: Serial Publications by Artists Since 1955’ (JRP Ringier), and ‘Punk Sex Bodies’ (Dashwood). His artworks and films have been exhibited throughout the world, including the British Film Institute, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and Palais de Tokyo, Paris.