#sendep

Consecration krajem maja na regionalnoj turneji

Posle nekoliko koncerata po Srbiji, ove godine beogradski sastav Consecration kreće na regionalnu turneju po Grčkoj, Makedoniji i Bugarskoj. (more…)

We have recently observed the reemergence of sensory deprivation (sendep)—in particular flotation tank REST (Restricted Environmental Stimulation Therapy)—as a kind of luxury service in urban centers. Floating was first developed neuropsychiatrist John C. Lilly in 1954, who used isolation tanks to test the effects of sensory deprivation (often in combination with LSD) and explore the nature of consciousness. Though extended or forced sensory deprivation has been deemed a form of torture—British armed forces used sendep techniques in Northern Ireland to interrogate prisoners, for example—short-term sessions are used in alternative medicine as a form of therapy. A recent Vogue trend piece described REST as promising "many lifestyle benefits, including lasting calm, heightened creative thought, and greater suppleness of skin." Floating, which dresses up mid-century quackery as bleeding edge body hacking, speaks to the paradoxical nature of contemporary tech culture, a chimera of bohemian 1960s counterculture, radical individualism, and neoliberal economics. Floating is for the Kurzweilian transhumanist: the die-hard Burner and Bulletproof coffee early adopter. It is about being completely inward-facing—perfectly self-immersed—while also becoming free of the self and its corporeal nature. You are you, but better; you, but without limits (i.e. a mortal body). Floating, indeed, fulfills the impossible desire to be in control while also losing yourself; to be in your comfort zone while also pushing your limits. Unsurprisingly, sendep tools and techniques naturally bleed into sexual fetish (specifically bondage), a potent fount of magical thinking. A Google search of "sensory deprivation," for example, returns grainy photos of early "black-out" masks used in float tanks alongside "Total Sensory Deprivation Black Leather Hood" sold by Strict Leather on Amazon. The ideal techno-utopian self, the immortal cyborg, is perhaps then a kind of fetishized object: man as iPhone.