Indent: The Body & The Performative

Last-ing

An edition accrues over time. The etymological underpinnings of the term ‘edition’ gesture at acts of ‘giving’, ‘producing’, or ‘bringing forth’, doing so ‘out of’ or ‘from within’ bodies and repositories of people, ideas and images. Last-ing has been several years in the making, starting from murmurs in 2020, to a proposal in 2021, and finally, an edition with 12 works spanning writing, video, and photographs in 2022. What it has meant to us has changed constantly; imagined in a shaky post-pandemic moment, it now manifests as the intention to endure, to remain, to leave traces. To last, leakily.

Indent originated as a project of Gati Dance Forum, a dance organization in New Delhi. It was set up with the intention of exploring the relationship between the body and performance, with its mapping of this performative body expanding across space, time, and disciplinary boundaries with each edition. In 2022, Indent is imagined with collaborators working across time zones. Besides furthering an engagement with a performative and embodied imagination, it has also allowed us to consider what it means to edit and publish a ‘journal’. In making space for various textures of ‘writing’, from the diaristic to the academic to the visual, it can no longer rely on uniformity as harmonizing force, in using the same citation system, or models of ‘blind’ peer review. Journals are messy, leaky affairs, and Last-ing stays true to this confusion.

Moving away from a more conventional system of peer review that we implemented in previous editions, where external reviewers responded to contributors, this year, we set up peer review groups with contributors from the present edition, where they responded to each other’s work. This allowed long conversations to unfold between contributors, who then took some of that feedback into revised drafts of their work.

Instead of being released in a single drop of 10-12 works, this year, Indent releases 2-3 works per week, to allow readers to spend dedicated time with each of the works. This means that there is a shift in how the editors introduce the issue. Instead of doing a single introductory note, we write episodic texts each week.

How does a journal constitute itself? ‘Mapping’ how the 12 works speak to each other has been a large part of this year’s editing process. This included working with illustrator Alia Sinha to visualize a mind-map of the edition. The map takes many forms, appearing as a GIF and a series of still images that are further broken down into detailed segments as we release each work.

 

FIGURE OF DESIRE/ZOE

ANISH CHERIAN

 

i am it, i am the armadillidiidae; the one infected with the bacterium wolbachia that can turn me into anything it pleases.

But i am not it, for i was something else already.

i wish i could take you to the day, back to my tiny barsati in Adchini where i lay squeamish on the floor, as I generally am. i remember the events but forget what i was back then. but i was squeamish, trailing a colony of isopods, wondering if armadillos were becoming something else. In my boredom, ineptitude and ignorance, I kept indulging in their short lifespan, indexing these bugs that would roll up into a ball if i wished to touch them.

or maybe i was the room, in which case i believe i was annoyed at this infestation.

my desire for you to see that day exactly like i want is not perverse, despite what they might call it. for but i wish i could show you that day, show it exactly as i want. i wish i could remind you of all our deviance. for in your forgetfulness, you’ve made me a vestigial class when all i’ve ever wanted was to be a class part.

did you know i was stung by a wasp a long time ago? that was all that was of that life. no, the wasp did not survive and here i could not survive in any other moment. do you remember the first time you were stung, did you feel the adrenaline corrupting your childhood. do you remember all the other times you’ve craved more of it.

are you predisposed to your current notion of me and instruct me to move elsewhere so i become another. i have no qualms with you, for i guess i could have been you. there have been many miscarriages before i got to be angular. but you have to know that i would not have had a care to have been in this ethical conundrum. for equating ER with EPR has my mind split.

i spoke of malarkey in a party and wondered if you fancied it. for i wanted everyone to fancy it, but the odour from a roasting swine killed any desire. and then we dined in this room that was folded too many times. I’ve heard that 26 is the maximum times anything can be folded. what are you willing to give up on if i were to tell i know of a way to make that 27th fold and were willing to teach you to always go one fold further.

i am going to bed now. and i shall be up soon. until then i believe you will be up and keep moving towards the centre. and if the destination gets elusive, meet me at the periphery where we whipped ourselves into these forms.

becoming yours truly
zoe

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