Kraken

Créatures mythiques, monstres légendaires, animaux improbables... Depuis la nuit des temps, les voyageurs ont peuplé les mondes lointains d'êtres aussi fascinants qu'effrayants. Basilic ou invunche au corps hideux, Niam Niam ou Lestrygon aux moeurs étrangers, Fiura ou sirène aux pouvoirs envoûtants, satyre ou homme-singe entre humanité et bestialité, nasique, orang-outang, baleine, éléphant et autres animaux exotiques élevés par les récits au rang de légendes... Ce bestiaires illustré, véritable cabinet de curiosités des voyageurs, nous transporte aux frontières du réel et des imaginaires.

En 1555 se publicaba en Roma la Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus, del clérigo sueco Olao Magno. Esta obra gozó de un impacto extraordinario en su momento, y vendría a significar el principio de una larga saga dedicada a los monstruos marinos, siendo repetida, copiada e imitada hasta la saciedad, tanto en su texto como en sus ilustraciones. En la segunda mitad del siglo XVII, sin embargo, su influencia sobre los medios académicos comienza ya desvanecerse, ya que la ingenuidad y la credulidad del autor no constituían, precisamente, las mejores cartas de presentación en un momento en que comienza a manifestarse una gran preocupación por la busca de testigos cualificados y de criterios de verificación, puntos fundamentales de ese nuevo modelo de conocimiento al que damos en llamar Revolución científica. Sin embargo, en 1752 aparecía en Copenhague Det første Forsøg paa Norges naturlige Historie, que sería traducida al inglés tres años más tarde como la Natural History of Norway, y que contribuiría a revitalizar el venerable género literario de los monstruos marinos, enriqueciendo incluso su acerbo con una nueva criatura, el kraken....

En un artículo publicado en esta revista el pasado mes de abril  se comentaban algunos aspectos generales de la versión del mito de Perseo que se daba en la película "Furia de titanes". Hay,  no obstante, algunos temas en los que se puede profundizar y entre ellos tal vez el más interesante sea el de los monstruos. Los monstruos clásicos que aparecen en "Furia de titanes" son Pegaso, las Grayas, Medusa y las Gorgonas, y una criatura del mar que en la película llaman Kraken, nombre que, como ya dije en su día, pertenece a la mitología nórdica, aunque el monstruo aparece en las aventuras de Perseo.

As a fundamentally interdisciplinary sector of study, oceanography spans not only the physical and chemical attributes of large saline aquatic environments, but also overlaps with biological considerations of oceanic flora and fauna, and incorporates a wide variety of sub-topics, from orbital wave dynamics, to plate tectonics, to acoustic oceanography. As a major component of the planetary surface, oceans therefore additionally form a significant component of Earth Science study, particularly in an era of ongoing and accelerating climate change.
However, one interdisciplinary intersection which has largely been hitherto underexplored is that of oceanography’s overlap with the speculative arts, a subset which might be termed speculative oceanography. This paper intends to address this gap in research by collating and reprising existing speculative oceanography, in order to identify and codify the broad areas of interest and future study which arise therefrom. One such area identified, which explores the oceanographic properties of non-terrestrial large aquatic bodies, is herein termed exo-oceanography, for example. The paper concludes with a call for greater interdisciplinary co-operation between oceanographic researchers and speculation methodologies.

This article explores an example of recontextualization in popular culture. As a case study, the article takes a closer look at how the Kraken, known from Scandinavian folklore, has been recontextualized into Greek mythology. After a survey of the lore of the Kraken, attention is turned to the 1981 movie "Clash of the Titans", where the Kraken plays a prominent role and where the Kraken is first put in the context of Greek mythology. In order to see this movie’s impact on popular culture’s discourse on the Kraken, the paper examines the discourse of the
Kraken in popular culture, both before and after "Clash of the Titans". The analysis ends with a closer look at an expansion of the popular card game "Magic: The Gathering": the "Theros" set from 2013, where the game is set in a world based on Greek mythology. By following the
design process of this game, we see an example of what may be termed “open recontextualization”. The designers’ main motivation for including the Kraken in the "Theros" set is to meet the expectations of the players, which in turn is based on the appearance of the Kraken in "Clash of the Titans". By studying this process, this article aims to contribute to our
understanding of the reception of Antiquity in popular culture.

There has been little elaboration of complicity’s etymology and how this inheritance connects the idea of complicity to spatiality. This paper approaches the villains of China Miéville’s award-winning 2011 novel Kraken as figures that can help elaborate this resonance within complicity. Kraken is a unique novel for Miéville because it breaks with the genre strictures of the Weird before Miéville again advances the virtues of such generic procedures. Goss and Subby are Kraken’s centuries-old assassins for darkly sacred hire. Their comic thuggery is imagined with supernatural abilities to fold, stretch, and swallow in implacable pursuit of the protagonist, squid caretaker Billy Harrow, through the multiapocalypti London underworld. It will be argued that these spatio-corporeal movements of Goss and Subby align their villainy with complicity’s etymological inheritance as an invitation to comply. Composed of ‘com’ and ‘plicit’, or, ‘with’ and ‘fold’, complicity is weirded by Miéville’s villains. The horror of Goss and Subby is that their devouring violence is invited, and devout.

This article analyses a database of 44 squatted social centres in Rotterdam. The database provides a useful lens to examine the squatters' movement which in Rotterdam (as opposed to other larger cities such as Amsterdam or London) is underground and little studied. The database was produced through reference to a range of sources, including participant observation, archive materials, conversations with squatters past and present, academic sources and activist websites. The projects are analysed in terms of time period, duration, location and type of building occupied. A problem experienced and evaluated is the lack of both primary and secondary sources. Some significant individual projects are described and one area for which suitable information data is available, the district of Bospolder, is used as a case study regarding the issue of gentrification (which first necessitates a review of the relevant literature on gentrification). Conclusions are reached about the cycles, contexts and institutionalisation of the squatters' movement in Rotterdam.

This article examines squatted social centres in Amsterdam and the political squatters' movement which created them. Amsterdam has long been regarded as one of the squatting strongholds of Western Europe. A database of 115 social centres is analysed in terms of housing, legalisation processes, time period, duration of project, type of building occupied and location by borough. The database was produced using a range of sources, including participant observation, archive materials, conversations with squatters past and present, academic sources and activist websites. I
consider external factors affecting the squatters' movement such as gentrification and anti-squatting. I pay particular attention to the broedplaats concept as it pertains to institutionalisation, with significant individual projects described where appropriate. Conclusions are then reached
about the contexts, cycles and institutionalisation processes of the squatters' movement in Amsterdam.

El presente ensayo se plantea como un homenaje a la agrupación colombiana de Heavy Metal Kraken. En su desarrollo, se indaga en el contexto político, económico y sociocultural de la década de los 80’s en Colombia y en la relación de la juventud con el mismo, a fin de obtener diversas conclusiones que nos permitan entender los resultados conceptuales, estéticos y sonoros obtenidos por la agrupación.

Palabras clave:
Kraken, heavy metal, contexto, juventud.

In his book recently published by the German publisher Matthes & Seitz Berlin, writer and media scientist Matthias Wittmann made the octopus the central figure for an analysis and criticism of our cultural and media history. He describes the animal as an incessant deviation and a virtuoso of ambiguity. For V/A, Wittmann pursued some of the aspects that emerged from his essay further and consulted the Kraken for an ambivalent diagnosis of the present. We will publish his text in three parts over the next few days, accompanied and framed by stills from the film Report to an Academy by Irish artist Sarah Browne. The following first part suggests that we’re not only in the midst of a society of the tentacle, but might also let the octopus help us imagine new modes and narratives of collectivization – open to new inclusions, intervals and interspaces.

Onderzoek naar de mogelijkheden om de "Cross-cultural Theory of Urban Social Movements" van Manuel Castells toe te passen op Amsterdam en de Amsterdamse kraakbeweging. Daartoe is deze theorie toegepast op een beperkt deel van de Amsterdamse binnenstad en het georganiseerde kraken daar in de periode tot 1986.