‘The ‘International Smoke-in’ is a collaborative project in which a number of different artistic agendas are involved. However, for me it is largely a ‘symbolic network performance’ raising questions about social function under highly mediated digital conditions’.

“Music and smoking have consistently been used in my work as vehicles for exploring the uncertain space between physiological and mediated (cultural) experience. Music with its primal, ‘oceanic’ qualities of rhythm and harmony; in contrast to the immense diversity of behavioral response; from the pelvic motion of Elvis to the cadaverous leer of Marilyn Manson. Smoking with its neuro-chemical reaction and cathartic lymphatic impact from which emerges the Clint Eastwood frontiersman black cigarette, the Marlene Dietrich gloved hand cigarette holder , the pipe smoking professor and the street lamp lit hat and cloak cigarette of the under cover agent.”

“The almost uniquely human habit of drug taking and particularly smoking nicotine has long fascinated me with its dual operation at physiological and the social levels. Manifesting itself simultaneously with deeply embedded symbolic references in society, literature, cinema and television and as a bio-chemical reaction; smoking is associated with sex, death, rock and roll, evil, coolness, liberal intellectualism, sophistication, glamour, power and almost all varieties of subversion. “

In this way, smoking can be a form of communication and as such it seems to fit with those aspects of human behavior associated with the limbic brain. This is the physiological locus or the source of all forms of emotional and social intelligence including social awareness and the ability to form bonds of love and friendship. Subtle, non linguistic connection in populations of mammals and particularly primates has been described as Limbic Resonance and serves to facilitate the unspoken function of social capability, self awareness and consciousness itself. Limbic Resonance has been shown to be so important that not only is it essential to social success but in fact survival itself is contingent upon appropriate limbic connectedness.

“…because human physiology is (at least in part) an open-loop arrangement, an individual does not direct all of his own functions. A second person transmits regulatory information that can alter hormone levels, cardiovascular function, sleep rhythms, immune function, and more – inside the body of the first. The reciprocal process occurs simultaneously: the first person regulates the physiology of the second, even as he himself is regulated. Neither is a functioning whole on his own; each has open loops that only somebody else can complete. Together they create a stable, properly balanced pair of organisms. And the two trade their complimentary data through the open channel their limbic connection provides”. ("A General Theory of Love” T.Lewis MD, F.Amini MD, R.Lannan MD)

Smoking; with its dualistic physiological and cultural dimensions could be viewed as symbolic of the limbic human dimension. It involves an oral action very similar to infant suckling which results in a chemically triggered sense of satisfaction. Nicotine travels to the brain about eight to 10 seconds after a smoker inhales and alters the state of the smoker. Nicotine does this by becoming both a neurotransmitter, a chemical substance that transmits signals from one nerve cell to another, and a stimulant. Nicotine mimics the body's most crucial neurotransmitter, acetycholine (ACH), which controls heart rate and message sending within the brain.

For me smoking is utilized as a symbol of limbic function and the ‘International Smoke – In’ explores the idea of Limbic function under highly mediated conditions. Is the ‘open-loop arrangement’ of physiological regulation possible in a virtual environment or between audience and cinematic protagonist even?

To what degree can Limbic Resonance occur in a social environment highly augmented by the hyper real?

[Text for the Session]

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