The prefix cata- (Gr. 'down') has an ominous ring to it, of things going badly wrong, catastrophes, cataclysms, of things catapulting us towards destruction. The suffix -lysis (Gr. 'loosening') does not seem much brighter, alluding to disintegration and rupture and to things falling apart. What good and productive could then be said of artistic research in the name of catalysis? Maybe the use of 'catalysis' here as something descriptive of artistic research processes can amount to no more than a case of catachresis - the use of a word in the wrong context, a severely misplaced figure of speech? Read more »