AN IRREVERSIBLE CHANGE OF FORM

2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of JG Ballard’s controversial novel Crash. Revered for his dark portrayals of dystopian modernity, Crash was ‘received with a uniform howl of incomprehension’ by its critics. Exploring the merging points of technology, sexuality and consumerism Ballard looked into the darkest corners of a future accelerating at break-neck speed, but even amongst the carnage he managed to find glimmers of reinvention. Ballard stated that “Crash is above all a cautionary tale, a warning against the brutal, erotic and overlit future that beckons us, ever more powerfully.”

Writing posthumously about Ballard’s work, author John Gray said “…the central thrust of his work is that disaster is not always an entirely negative experience. A seemingly destructive alteration in the outer world – geophysical or socio-political – may be the trigger for a process of psychological breakthrough. Instead of being destroyed, Ballard's characters are liberated by catastrophe. Far from being a type of dystopian prophecy – though at times it is that too – his work has at its core an experience of inner transformation and renewal.”

‘An Irreversible Change of Form’ is, in part, a reaction to the 50th anniversary of JG Ballard’s dystopian novel CRASH, and an exploration of destruction and rebirth through the lens of this year’s graduating cohort. It became a reflection of the world around us, the experience of the last three years and the search for what’s to come. If reinvention and rebirth can be achieved on a micro-scale what new forms and what new utopias could be born from the rubble of something larger?’

The process became a reflection of the world around us, the experience of the last three years and the search for what’s to come. If reinvention and rebirth can be achieved on a micro scale what new forms and what new utopias could be born from the rubble of something larger? As Ballard concluded in his 1973 interview with James Goddard’s Cypher zine, we needed ‘An extreme metaphor at a time when only the extreme will do’.