Beyond Repair

From my typewriter series. Berlin, 03.09.24.

1. Repair as a material practice. Objects that can no longer not anymore be reinstated to their original, or default, state. No spare parts, no manuals or tools or skills available. Defective by design, designed to fail asap. Nevermind the original purposes uses, it is impractical. And still, there are other uses, other combinations, the need to reimagine them uses (use value of objects regardless of their first - and superficial, limited - exchange value). That picture leaves a lot outside the frame. Reuse beyond repair.
2. Repair as economic disobedience. Global neoliberal surveillance colonial extractivist anthropocenogenic capitalism hates repair. \[It\] despises it, fears it. What if people of the world, - ordinary people, real humans, - get good at repairing their things? What if their technological disobedience and community values join forces? People sharing skills and parts and tools in a convivial way? They might end up buying less stuff, and that is obviously against everything cKapital stands for. Even worse, they may start helping each other for the sake of it, not money or likes or followers. This is dangerous. Collectivism beyond repair.
3. Repair as a conceptual question. Is there an essential moment of divergence? An object is potentially repairable until someone with sufficient knowledge says 'not anymore'. It does not cease to exist on that moment, though - or does it? Re-parare, make something ready again. Is upcycling not repair? Repurposing not repair? Repair beyond repair.