In this new BAG TALK episode, Elizaveta Federmesser is joined by internet archivist, media researcher, and senior scientist of the Weibel Institute for Digital Cultures, Sophie Publig. They discuss Freud vs. Edward Cullen, the call girl from Scream, black hole bags and making backpacks sexy again, EMO color coding and Sophie’s cubing, intellectual party bender, Gel nails are like crack by Bethany Frankel, the 2016 makeup, when orange eyeshadow cosplayed as nude, why Jeff Koons stopped art history, Richard Dawkins, and how Nara Smith cooking from scratch is the true gene of culture, 1920s flash mobs, phone pranks, Internet Archive baddies, joking anonymously, joking as a group, humor as freedom, opting into a joke, “i am not getting IT”, 67, decide to have a LOL, humor VS reference alchemy, iconoclasm tactics in memes, affirming the message, “mind-view-whatever-online”, icon defacing as face-swap, how to be the Angel, giving power to the meaninglessness of the aesthetic by injecting holy spirit into it, romanticism and the vessel of the meaning, spiritual psycosis, religion as a marketplace, hot priests calendar, us kissing on the intersection is the Taj Mahal, Sixteenth Chapel, and Giza pyramid of the online, Kek the ancient Egyptian god of darkness, the link up we don’t want: Anthropic Pope, the meaning of Slop getting overstretched, and what if we kissed on the intersection of Kardashians and Paul McCarthy? Listen to hear Elizaveta struggle to pronounce “kirkification” and supplement the word paganism with simply “antique stuff”. Sophie Publig InstagramElizaveta Federmesser Instagram BAGMAG + BAG TALK Instagram Get a copy of BAGMAG Sophie Publig is an internet archaeologist exploring digital ecosystems and their artefacts. Based at the Weibel Institute for Digital Cultures at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, her research and teaching focus on the dynamics of digital cultures through critical posthumanism, with current work on The Girl Online, the occult turn in networked infrastructures, and trajectories of schizoposting and brain rot. Her work examines internet subcultures ranging from meme ecologies and algorithmic subjectivities to digital folklore, alongside ongoing research into platform aesthetics. She co-authored Digital Occultism (2026) with Mikkel Rørbo. Elizaveta Federmesser is a cultural strategist and researcher. She is also the founder and editor of BAGMAG, an independent cultural research publication distributed internationally by Antenne Books London. Elizaveta hosts BAG TALK, a video and audio interview series on fashion, media theory, and internet culture, and works as a brand and culture strategist and creative consultant for organizations. She has presented original cultural research as an invited keynote speaker for Chanel’s European Head Office and guest-lectured on fashion, AI, and media theory at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit federmess.substack.com
