Verdurin /vəʁdyrɛ̃/ is a project space in East London hosted by Pierre d’Alancaisez and programmed with friends.
Verdurin presents an idiosyncratic mix of events, courses, and exhibitions addressing urgent cultural, political, and philosophical questions through visual culture.
Verdurin is also a concept store and publisher, providing the essentials an aesthete will need to survive cultural doomsday: daring literature, artefacts deserving of perdurance, and artisanal provisions.
d’Alancaisez was first inspired to marshal an audience to discuss politics, art, and ideas critically in response to the failure of institutions and the breakdown in the cultural order following the pandemic.
The name Verdurin is borrowed from Proust’s literary character Mme Verdurin who in À la recherche du temps perdu hosts a literary salon. Verdurin today carries on her spirit of conviviality and mutual edification.
We are happy to receive pitches and ideas for events, performances, launches, screenings, talks relating to art, culture, politics, and philosophy.
Team
Pierre d’Alancaisez
Pierre d’Alancaisez is a curator and critic, and the founder of Verdurin.
Amir Naaman
Amir Naaman is a novelist and a personal trainer.
Nina Power
Nina Power is a philosopher and critic.
Travis Jeppesen
Travis Jeppesen is the author of numerous books and the creator of object-oriented writing.
Emma Bielecki
Emma Bielecki is a lecturer, writer, and researcher. She splits her time between London and nineteenth-century Paris.
Lola Salem
Lola Salem is a researcher and cultural strategist.
Artists, contributors, guests
Mark Vernon
Mark Vernon is a psychotherapist and writer.
Edward McLaren
Edward McLaren is a DPhil candidate at Oxford studying and author of Bothelford’s Gone.
Joshua Knapp
Joshua Knapp is the author of The Haxton Review. He lives in West Yorkshire.
Brian Evenson
Brian Evenson is the author of a dozen books of fiction, including ‘Phantom Limb’, recipient of the Shirley Jackson Award, the O’Henry Prize, and the Guggenheim Award.
Zinovy Zinik
Zinovy Zinik is a Russian-born author of eighteen books of fiction and nonfiction.
Jaspreet Singh Boparai
Jaspreet Singh Boparai is a classicist and a contributing editor of The Lamp.
James Mumford
James Mumford is the author of Vexed, and has written about ethics, literature, and politics for US and British outlets.
Ashley Frawley
Ashley Frawley is the author of Semiotics of Happiness and Significant Emotions.
Julian Stallabrass
Julian Stallabrass is the author of ‘Art in the Age of Populism’, photographer, and curator of ‘The Spectre of the People’.
Gregory Sholette
Gregory Sholette is a New York-based artist, writer, teacher, and activist.
Dominic Green
Dominic Green is a historian, columnist, and critic.
David Roden
David Roden is a musician and writer of theory/fiction exploring dubious alternatives to our existence.
Maya Pettersen
Maya Pettersen is a Vedic astrologer, writer, and esotericist.
Peter Rollins
Peter Rollins’s “Church of the Contradiction” exists at the intersection between philosophy, psychoanalysis, theology, and liturgy.
Jacob Phillips
Jacob Phillips is a Catholic theologian and cultural commentator.
Nick Hostettler
Nick Hostettler is a lecturer in politics.
Kit Ramsay
Kit Ramsay is a film and festival programmer, and perennial audience member on the scene.
Jacob Siegel
Jacob Siegel is writer and a contributing editor at Tablet.
Alison Brady
Alison Brady is a philosopher of education investigating writing pedagogy in the age of AI.
Ben Sixsmith
Ben Sixsmith is a writer living in Upper Silesia and online editor of The Critic.
Liam Blackford
Liam Blackford is an Australian writer and poet.
