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TechGnosis

The work of Erik Davis

Erik Davis is an American writer, scholar, journalist, and public speaker whose writings range from rock criticism to cultural analysis to esoteric explorations of California’s history.

I’ve been publishing stuff for over three decades, and most of it—with the exception of my books—resides on this site, which I have maintained through various iterations since the late 1990s. With Burning Shore now disseminating my fresher communiqués, Techgnosis.com acts more than ever as an archive of my work, including lectures, interviews, personal reflections, and almost a decade of the Expanding Mind podcast. Like Techgnosis itself, still in print and more relevant than ever, my stuff combines deep research with vivid writing and oracular aims that resonate through the years. For this revamped trans-temporal site, I and my team have introduced more robust searching and cross-linking of materials, as well as a roll-the-dice feature, which will hopefully allow for richer, more entertaining, and more synchronistic wanders through this wunderkammer.  — Erik

  • Books

    Blotter

    The Untold Story of an Acid Medium

    The Untold Story of an Acid Medium

    Blotter by Erik Davis is the first comprehensive written account of the history, art, and design of LSD blotter paper, the iconic drug delivery device that will perhaps forever be linked to underground psychedelic culture and contemporary street art. Created in collaboration with Mark McCloud’s Institute of Illegal Images, the world’s largest archive of blotter art, Davis’s boldly illustrated exhibition treats his outsider subject with the serious, art-historical respect it deserves...

A Random Selection

The Comic Book of Thoth
Esoterica
The Comic Book of Thoth
One hundred (and maybe one) years of the Rider Waite Smith Tarot

Practicing Spiritual Practice
Media
60 min
Practicing Spiritual Practice
With Jennifer Dumpert

How to Die
Expanding Mind Podcast
How to Die
Expanding Mind

Remote Control
Mind and Philosophy
Remote Control
The car speaks

A Brief History of Queer Psychedelia
Media
A Brief History of Queer Psychedelia
Video Lecture, June 1, 2019

Foreword: HFT The Gardener
Art and Design
Foreword: HFT The Gardener
Suzanne Treister's latest art project

Trance Planet
Subcultures
Trance Planet
The Analog Life, Arthur issue 31

American Cosmic, Part One
Expanding Mind Podcast
American Cosmic, Part One
Expanding Mind