Category: Shrink Activism

Fóxì

January 5, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

‘Tang Ping‘ or ‘Lying flat’ can be translated as a resistance to participate in the tempo and demands of current neo-liberal society by doing very little or nothing. Fóxì, or Buddha-like, is a rather more frequently used word similar to tang ping. Buddha-like youth, also…

The Not So Resolute Desk

November 30, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

At first sight it seems rather curious that a man so sensitive to the image of power as is Donald Trump, would allow to be photographed sitting behind a very small desk. His large body in relation to the small table just looks awkward. Plus,…

Kohrisms

March 15, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

The Austrian economist and political scientist Leopold Kohr opposed the “cult of bigness” in social organization. He inspired the movement for a human scale and the Small Is Beautiful movement. His most influential work was The Breakdown of Nations. In 1983, he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award. In the…

The Zooms: The Feynman Zoom

March 13, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

The Zooms are modest symbolic gestures intended to initiate an embodied practise of the desire for smaller. Although they are often hardly more than physical whispers these actions attempt to overcome the inability to act in the face of the omnipresent desire for BIG. They…

Height Blind

January 8, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

Greater height in humans is commonly associated with advantages such as leadership skills, wealth, intelligence or social status. Differences between short and tall men are often found for these traits, mainly in favour of tall men. But are height-related effects biologically determined or do they…

The Kampung Lodan Miracle

November 15, 2019 By arne hendriks Off

The Kampung Lodan Miracle was a shrink event that took place on the river banks of the Ciliwung river in Jakarta in the summer of 2017. Two local seamstresses resized a pair of jeans and a shirt of 195cm tall Arne Hendriks into a fitting…

Guangzhou Reversal Room

December 30, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

The Incredible Shrinking Man was invited by the Guangzhou Triennial 2018, curated by Angelique Spaninks, Zhang Ga and Philip Ziegler, to resurrect one of its favourite shrink experiences: the Ames room. An Ames room allows people to visually experience a shift in body size by…

Implosion Fabrication

December 27, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

It’s not quite the Dehnel phenomenon but implosion fabrication does allow for a different perspective on shape shifting, size and shrinking and may just add a piece to the puzzle of achieving a smaller size for that bloated hydro-species by the name of Homo sapiens. Researchers…

The Cell Cycle: Mitogen

December 19, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

The Cell Cycle investigates the mechanisms and substances that regulate cell division and growth. The process of deciding to divide, or not, is a highly regulated interplay of messages and receptors reporting on the state of the environment and the state of the cell. While…

Calimero Complex

November 14, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

In the Low Countries the Calimero Complex refers to people, organisations or countries that feel they’re under-appreciated because of their small size. The name given to the complex refers to the lead character Calimero in an Italian animated cartoon series featured in the early 70’s…

Shrink Exercise: Buster’s Unfolding

September 21, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

Buster Keaton was a master of visual comedy in the era of the silent movie. His use of props and perspective often brilliantly deflates presumptions on how things are supposed to be. In the opening scene of The High Sign (1921) the simple gesture of unfolding…

Zebrafish Oannes

September 17, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

The zebrafish is one of The Incredible Shrinking Man’s most beloved spirit animals. Being a model organism for endocrinological and genetic research positions it between fact and fiction, the known and the unknown and the present and the future. Thus it invites us into realms…

Hallmarks of Malignant Growth: Resisting Apoptosis

June 11, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

In trying to understand what makes continuous growth such a powerful idea (despite clear evidence that growth often becomes harmful) The Incredible Shrinking Man turned to cancer research to learn how growth as part of a healthy and balanced system turns malignant. Although cancer is…

Temperance

May 8, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

Temperance is defined as moderation or voluntary self-restraint and characterized as the control over excess. It is what an individual voluntarily refrains from doing. This includes restraint from retaliation in the form of non-violence and forgiveness, restraint from arrogance in the form of humility and modesty, and…

Shrink Exercise: Growth Chart Resilience

May 6, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

When we say that the human species is obsessed with growth we mean that even without specific context any decline or absence of growth mostly inspires a negative response. At the same time an increase creates a positive feeling. Through a series of simple exercises…

Abundance Fantasies: Mukbang

April 9, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

In our series of abundance fantasies we investigate if and how the human desire for abundance can become a positive force for change. Most abundance fantasies revolve around an illustration of the central promise that if we act in a certain way we will be…

Readyquotes

April 4, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

Readyquotes are slightly altered quotes by known thinkers and makers. The spirit of the original quote often is already a reflection of the interests expressed within the research of The Incredible Shrinking Man but may have one or two words changed to allow us to…

Side-tunneling

January 28, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

The small have strategies to ensure that their genetic knowledge on how to be small is preserved. Since smaller size within a species often means the individual lacks the physical strength to power their way into the female’s heart they need to outsmart the strong.…

Idolatry of Giantism

January 1, 2018 By arne hendriks Off

“What I wish to emphasise is the duality of the human requirement when it comes to the question of size: there is no single answer. For his different purposes man needs many different structures, both small one and large ones, some exclusieve and some comprehensive.…

Lodan Report: Private to Public

October 19, 2017 By arne hendriks Off

Kampung Lodan, Kampung Kerapu and Kampung Tongkol are three villages situated on the banks of the Ciliwung river in the sinking Indonesian city of Jakarta. Because the river beds along the Ciliwung were, and increasingly are, subjected to regular flooding it was never a popular…