To take Octavia Butler’s fiction seriously requires us to devote time and space to dwell on the images of thought advanced throughout her novels. To convene a space and a time for verbalising the letter and the spirit of Octavia Butler’s dangerous visions. The aspiration to hold open a time and a space to think with Octavia Butler is what animates the idea of DXG: Dept. of Xenogenesis. Think of DXG as a space-time for taking the time and the space to think with the idea of xenogenesis formulated by Octavia Butler in 1987. An idea that runs throughout her oeuvre from Patternmaster in 1971 to Fledgling in 2005. Think of DXG as a time-space convened by Kodwo Eshun and Anjalika Sagar of the Otolith Collective to register the forms of epistemic shock specific to the science fictions of Octavia Butler. A way of hosting a space-time for co-creating a consciousness of the methods developed by Octavia Butler for suspending disbelief in the worlds that she built.

On 20 February 2022, DXG convenes a discussion around the writing of Octavia Butler with Rasheedah Phillips, co-founder of Black Quantum Futurism at Café Oto. A conversation that returns to and departs from the Constellation 8​/​∞ ( Octonionic Constellation), a ‘Sonic celebration of OCTAVia eSTELLE’ produced by Rasheedah Phillips and Camae Ayewa of Black Quantum Futurism Collective on 11th January 2015.  

Rasheedah Phillips is a queer housing advocate, parent, writer, interdisciplinary artist, and cultural producer who uses web-based projects, glitch art, zines, short film, archival practices, experimental non-fiction, speculative fiction, printmaking, performance, social practice, installation and creative research to explore the construct of time, temporalities, and community futurisms through a Black futurist cultural lens and experience. Phillips is the founder of The AfroFuturist Affair, founding member of Metropolarity Queer Speculative Fiction Collective, co-founder of Black Quantum Futurism, co-creator of the award winning Community Futures Lab, and creator Black Women Temporal Portal and Black Time Belt projects. Recognized as a national expert in housing policy, Phillips is a 2016 graduate of Shriver Center Racial Justice Institute, 2018 Atlantic Fellow for Racial Equity, and 2021 PolicyLink Ambassador for Health Equity. As part of BQF and as a solo artist, Phillips has been awarded a CERN Artists Residency, Vera List Center Fellowship, A Blade of Grass Fellowship, Velocity Fund Fellowship, among others, and has exhibited, presented at, been in residence, and performed at Institute of Contemporary Art London, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Serpentine Gallery, Red Bull Arts, Chicago Architecture Biennial, Akademie Solitude, Manifesta 13 Biennale, and more.