Amidst our unfolding economic and ecological permacrisis, the opportunity to see and discuss artists’ work in film and video, like so many subsidised cultural experiences, seems to be narrowing. Festivals shrink: four weeks to two; five days to three. Exhibitions extend: two months to three, to four, to six. In this cultural recession grows a surfeit of remarkable but neglected film and video—work which is inadequately shown, distributed, discussed, critiqued, archived, collected, preserved, remembered. Faced with an approaching monoculture, curators and programmers are challenged to intervene: to pursue diversity amidst sameness, to open channels amidst closure, to find surprise amidst expectation.

For DOWSER Issue 8 (Summer 2023), curator and writer Myriam Mouflih considers the fate of the screening as a mode of exhibition that is uniquely communal and discursive. Exceeding our present paucity, Projecting Abundance moves towards an imaginative framework for better working. In her imagining, Mouflih solicits the dreams of five allies from across the UK. Punctuating this issue, their thoughtful responses lend a necessary polyvocality to this projective project.

Against the individualising effects of an economic moment which privileges difference, Mouflih calls upon the collective in the co-production of screening futures. Succinctly modelled in the collaborative shape of this text, she finds a resolution in togetherness—amongst audience members, amongst organisers, and in the dissolution of distinctions between.

DOWSER is a non-profit project. This chapbook is released as an open access online PDF and in a limited print edition of 200. These printed versions are available for a contribution of £2.50.

Issue 8 has been made possible with the support of Creative Scotland.

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