Worn Out Joy

This body of work examines how a shared condition of exhaustion under contemporary capitalism—the accumulation of stress, alienation, and mental fatigue—is softened and regulated through calibrated forms of relief that leave its underlying causes intact.

This body of work examines how a shared condition of exhaustion under contemporary capitalism—the accumulation of stress, alienation, and mental fatigue—is softened and regulated through calibrated forms of relief that leave its underlying causes intact. Approaching exhaustion as a collective, structurally produced condition, I trace how it surfaces within everyday gestures and moments, and how it is normalized and managed through the spaces we inhabit and move through.

Central to the project are what I describe as “apparatuses of relief”: infrastructural features and spatial elements embedded in public and semi-public spaces that are designed to regulate affect and soothe nerves. Operating beneath the surface, these elements promise momentary relief and distraction, yet remain pervasively integrated within the very urban environments that generate the pressures we perpetually attempt to escape.