I have been spending a bit of time catching up on my Deleuze after a long hiatus, through the writing of Manuel DeLanda. It has given me a moment to reflect on how we perceive matter or our relation to it. Thinking about the way matter has its own ability to express itself does stop and make me think of how we connect to it rather than the continuous internalisation that is often the default position of the human condition, perceiving us as the focus of attention by god, economics, politics or any other structure that internalises our relation to the world. As I continue my research here with the aim of directing my studio work, it reminds me of one of my favourite books, Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse, and the way Hesse tries to grapple with the interconnections of matter through a philosophy of living as a way of making sense of our place within the world.