"Artistic practices are 'ways of doing and making' that intervene in the general distribution of ways of doing and making as well as in the relationships they maintain to modes of being and forms of visibility." --Jacques Rancière

Can we imagine lifestyles that reconfigure desire, care and creativity? Charles Atlas, in Hail the New Puritan, attempts to do so, as he follows the radical dance troupe of Michael Clark, et. al. Exploring themes of dance, urban life, queer and fluid sexuality, avant-garde art and fashion, etc., the film sketches an aestheticized vision of an alternative life, where collective creative production sits at the heart of both artistic and subjective (re)generation. The film, it is hoped, can open up some of these themes in order to spur discussion and imagination around the role of creativity in shifting the modes in which we deploy pleasure and care, and, ultimately, remaking our subjectivities.

Critical Hedonism(s) is an experimental social-intellectual project dedicated to redefining the ways that care and pleasure circulate and get expressed, integrating critical, analytical thought with experimentation and exploration. More here: http://www.criticalhedonisms.com/