This promises to be a happy and significant event, and I'll be there in person. I am in the UK for the next 2-3 months, and this is one of the events I'm most looking forward to.
All the details are below in the press release from the Institute. It would be a delight to meet you there, especially if you are one of my Patrons or supporters on Substack.
+++ PRESS RELEASE David Graeber Institute +++
LAUNCH OF DAVID GRAEBER INSTITUTE
29/10/22 / 19:00hrs / Alexandra & Ainsworth TRA Hall
52 Boundary Rd, London NW8 0HJ (Rowley Way)
WEBSITE: davidgraeber.org
EMAIL: info@davidgraeber.org
CONTACTS:
Nika Dubrovsky dubrovsky@gmail.com +44 7830 340468
Clive Russell clive@thisaintrocknroll.com +44 7921 087482
Roc Sandford rocsandford@mac.com +44 7525 751171
James Schneider Jamesghschneider@gmail.com +447753881993
At 19:00hrs (London time), October 29, 2022, the David Graeber Institute opens with its inaugural Apartment Art Exhibition APT / ART – CLIMATE EMERGENCY at 52 Boundary Rd, London NW8 0HJ (Rowley Way) simultaneously with parallel exhibitions taking place all over the world.
At 17:00hrs we'll do a press preview of the Carnaval and the workshop for the residence.
The David Graeber Institute opens two years after the death of David Graeber, anthropologist, activist, and author of several best-selling books — Debt: The First 5000 Years, Bullshit Jobs, and The Dawn of Everything. His forthcoming book Pirate Enlightenment will be published in January in numerous languages including editions by Penguin and FSG.
David left a vast archive of unpublished material. The David Graeber Institute continues his work on two major projects:
the elucidation and publication of the archive, and
the Brain Trust, a rolling convention of visionary thinkers assembled by David before he died.
The iconic Rowley Way Housing Estate was conceived by Neave Brown in the late '60s with the idea that people could live happily together. This harmonious social and architectural experiment embodies ideals we must cultivate in order to overcome climate and social emergency.
Community members, neighbours, friends, artists, and activists led by Reverend Billy and members of The Church of Stop Shopping together with the Red Rebel Brigade will walk along the famous red-brick Rowley Way road in a merry procession from Abbey Road to the TRA community building.
The APT / ART - CLIMATE EMERGENCY exhibition, prepared in collaboration with the Museum of Care and the Museum of Unrest, will be open for viewing. Participants from around the world will join us on zoom and show their APT / ART - CLIMATE EMERGENCY exhibitions.
Graeber's work remains the most rigorous and rousing evidence that there is an alternative to late-stage capitalism, that we have lived in better ways before and we may yet again. His corpus - straddling the activist and the academic worlds - is a resounding rebuttal to the notion that 'it is easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism.' Graeber proves that we don't have to *imagine* it, we can simply *remember* it, by studying the varied and rich history of our species.
Cory Doctorow, author of Chokepoint Capitalism and Walkaway
David Graeber challenges all of us to rethink the terms of scholarship that limit our imagination of better futures. I say "challenges" even though we have lost his living presence because his writing continues to advance these propositions, ever more urgent, that human beings are capable of creating conditions for living that enhance our freedoms. Accepting the challenge is a way for all of us to truly commemorate him-- remembering together that the past is not as it has been painted, and the future need not be bleak.
Rosemary A. Joyce, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley
At a moment when so much of the radical opposition has turned inwards and talks in dark, pessimistic ways about the future, David Graeber stood out like a shining star. He told us that human beings had created the world we have around us today - and he showed in clear prose how it had been done, and the twists and turns of power that had shaped the present confusion. But he was insistent on one thing: that we have the power to reshape it again - for the good of all. That the way is open. Not closed.
Adam Curtis film director
The late David Graeber was, and remains, one of the most original radical thinkers of our time. The new institute in his name promises to be a space of creative free thinking for the survival of the planet.
Marcus Rediker, author of The Slave Ship: A Human History
David played a critical role in proving that the belief that money evolved from barter was false. Since mainstream economists awarded their fake Nobel in 2022 to 3 economists who still push this myth, it's vital that the work that David began continues after his untimely demise.
Steve Keen, Honorary Professor, UCL & ISRS Distinguished Research Fellow
More than anyone else, David put the problems caused by debt on the map. He raised the discussion of the origins of debt – and his aim, the need to cancel it – out of academia into a best seller and, as an organizer, into Occupy Wall Street.
Michael Hudson, Distinguished Professor of Economics, UMKC, Professor, Lingnam University, Hong Kong, Honorary Professor, Wuhan
In my lifetime I have met no more than three people that could be marked as geniuses. David Graeber was one such. He had a truly awesome and expansive mind, one that was rigorous, but generous; open but questioning. He was intellectually fearless and adventurous, which made it thrilling to be in his company. He was also vulnerable, loving, and deeply loyal to his wide circle of friends and allies. His work on the history and anthropology of credit and debt has proved invaluable to those of us working on monetary theory and policy.
Ann Pettifor, Council Member, Progressive Economy Forum (PEF), Director Policy Research in Macroeconomics (PRIME)
Notes for Editors
NYC-based artist Rev Billy is a NYC based Activist and Performer (revbilly.com) and Red Rebel Brigade (
http://redrebelbrigade.com/
) will be part of the opening. David's friends: anthropologists, activists, artists, and musicians will be with us in London or at zoom.
Graeber's book Debt: The First 5000 Years was extremely important because it helped raise the veil on the paradigm of debt. Paradigms/paradigm concepts are like breathing, 99% of the time we are entirely unconscious of it/them, but when you can't breathe you suddenly realize just how important they are. Graeber, yourself and others like Michael Hudson, MMTers, Ann Pettifor, UBI advocates and Ellen Brown have the area of the problem well surrounded, namely "money, debt and banks". You just haven't completely crystalized in your minds the precise new paradigm concept and how to most efficaciously apply it to the economic system. It is notable that one of the reasons it took helio-centrism to be correctly acknowledged as the new reality was that originally it was less accurate than Ptolemaic cosmology. It took Gallileo's observation of the moons of Jupiter and finally Kepler's discovery of the elliptical nature of orbits to confirm its temporal universe reality and problem solving applicability. So it will be with the acceptance of the new paradigm for the creation and distribution of money and of personal debt. Find the point in the economic process where the new paradigm is universally participated in and experienced by every agent and you will macro-economically implement its benefits and problem resolving effects.