Professor Simon O'Sullivan

Simon is a theorist and artist working at the intersection of contemporary art practice, performance and philosophy.

Staff details

Professor Simon O'Sullivan

Position

Professor of Art Theory and Practice, Programme Leader MA in Contemporary Art Theory

Department

Visual Cultures

Email

s.o'sullivan (@gold.ac.uk)

Simon O’Sullivan is a theorist and artist working at the intersection of contemporary art practice, performance and continental philosophy. He has published widely in in these areas, often in relation to Deleuze and Guattari and, more recently in relation to fictioning and myth-work.

His most recent monographs are From Magic and Myth-Work to Care and Repair (2024) and (written with David Burrows) Fictioning: The Myth-Functions of Contemporary Art and Philosophy (2019).

His collaborative art practice – with David Burrows, Alex Marzeta and Vanessa Page, sometimes with and others – comes under the name Plastique Fantastique, a ‘performance fiction’ that involves an investigation into aesthetics, subjectivity, the sacred, popular culture and politics produced through, performance, film and sound work, comics, text, installations and assemblages. Plastique Fantastique have performed and exhibited widely in the UK and abroad and are represented by IMT Gallery in London.

Teaching and supervision

Supervision summary:

Aesthetics; Art Theory; Continental Philosophy; Modern and Contemporary Art (esp. Ritual and Performance, Fiction and Mythopoesis); Psycho/Schizo-analysis; The Production of Subjectivity; Non-Philosophy; Speculative Realism; Fictioning; Landscape; Occulture/Magic; Care and Repair; Hybrid Writing and Art Writing; Theory-Fiction; Archaeology and Art; the Ill and the Dead.

Teaching:

Programme Leader for MA Contemporary Art Theory. Teaching MA module 'From Art Writing to Theory-Fiction' and third year BA module on 'Occulture'. PhD, BA and MA Dissertation

Research interests

Aesthetics; Art Theory; Continental Philosophy; Modern and Contemporary Art (esp. Ritual and Performance, Fiction and Mythopoesis); Psycho/Schizo-analysis; The Production of Subjectivity; Non-Philosophy; Speculative Realism; Fictioning; Landscape; Occulture/Magic; Care and Repair; Hybrid Writing and Art Writing; Theory-Fiction; Archaeology and Art; the Ill and the Dead.

Publications and research outputs

Book

Book Section

Article

Project

Show/Exhibition

Conference or Workshop Item

Edited Book

Performance

Professional projects

Deatils and documentation of Plastique Fantastique can be found on the website above. A couple of indicative performances are below with links to documentation.