Jeremy Shaw's DMT

The article analyzes Jeremy Shaw's 2004 video work "DMT," in which the artist administered the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine to friends and filmed their experiences. It argues that Shaw curates the psychedelic session as a performance of the drug's agency and aesthetic power, contrasting his approach with clinical settings. Shaw acts as a session guide or caretaker, echoing the etymological meaning of "curating" as caring for souls. The setting uses a neutral "white cube" gallery with close headshots against a white background, enabling intimate examination of euphoric facial expressions, while subtitles from trip reports reveal participants' struggles to verbalize hallucinations. The article notes that DMT induces intense euphoria and hallucinations, has therapeutic uses for PTSD, addiction, and palliative care, and that the aesthetics of setting remain critical in shaping psychedelic experiences.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This article examines DMT by Jeremy Shaw, a Berlin-based Canadian artist whose oeuvre has investigated altered states. For this 2004 video work, Shaw administered the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine to a group of friends and videotaped their experiences. I am interested in how Shaw curates the psychedelic session as a performance of the drug’s agency and aesthetic power. A powerful entheogen similar to psilocybin and ayahuaska, DMT induces intense feelings of euphoria and hallucinations that have been used for divinatory and healing purposes. Beyond its recreational uses, DMT has been found to be effective in the therapeutic treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, substance addiction and in palliative care. Since their pioneering experiments of the 1960s, Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert and Ralph Metzner’s determinant of ‘setting’ -- the context of the psychedelic session -- has remained a critical factor. In current psychopharmacological research, the aesthetics of setting are now understood to be crucial in shaping the psychedelic experience. The affective contexts of Shaw’s psychedelic sessions provide a striking contrast to the institutional approximations of domestic interiors used in clinical trials. Shaw curates the psychedelic experience in several registers. First, Shaw’s role as session guide or care-taker for participants undergoing extraordinary states sustains the etymological meaning of ‘curating’ which originally described a catalytic encounter of one tasked with the care of souls (usually a priest). Second, Shaw configures the atmosphere of the setting with the neutral atmosphere of a ‘white cube’ gallery. Framed against a white background, close headshots of the person undergoing the psychedelic enable intimate examination of their euphoric facial expressions and intoxicated comportment. While the conceptual formality and white performance field are almost clinical, subtitles flashing at the bottom of the screen, drawn from trip reports by the artist, reveal his collaborators’ struggles to verbalize their hallucinations.