Real Review is a quarterly contemporary culture magazine with the strapline 'what it means to live today'. Their agenda focuses on the politics of space, and trying to understand how everyday conditions enforce and reinforce power relations.
The pandemic is an ongoing tragedy at every scale. Yet this collective trauma has become an excuse for global capital to accelerate the total commodification of everyday life. Everything is for sale. There is more merchandise than love, more sponsored content than truth. All hobbies are side hustles. Our networks are our net worth. Friendships are commercial partnerships.
The public and domestic spheres have merged, muddling our personal and professional identities. And without face-to- face communication, society has become a panopticon strictly regulated by corporate platforms. No society in human history has demanded so many people be such active participants
in producing the contemporary. No contemporary has ever been so aggressively monetised.
As a coping mechanism, many amongst us have decided to check out from reality altogether; preferring to inhabit tailor- made fantasies and simulations. But only children believe that closing their eyes renders them invisible to monsters. When the monsters are real, closing our eyes rather increases the danger. This issue of Real Review is dedicated to 'what to believe'.
Contributors to issue 11 include Carlo Rovelli, Kris Kozlowski Moore, Bella Gladman, Jack Self, Eddie Blake, Yuk Hui, Andi Schmeid, Keller Easterling, Maisa Imamovic, Chiara Di Leone, Laura Lizondo, Debora Domingo-Calabuig, Timothy Morton, and Helen Marten.
26 x 11.5 cm, softcover, Real Review (London).