The Failure of Commons? The Obscure Beijing Mushrooms & the Mycelial Networks of Transformation in Everyday Life

Against a backdrop of state-orchestrated calls for commoning, this article examines how a curatorial project – Beijing Mushroom – sprouted out of daily encounters between the non-living mushroom-looking objects and the ordinary residents has generated fungal-like contamination that spreads and triggers affective interconnections for citizens to engage with and reflect on the discursive practices of commoning in urban living environments. The analysis draws on ethnographic research that combines observations and interviews with local residents and project curators conducted in 2023, media materials, and the curatorial report. This article argues that dissensus with state-sanctioned commoning parallels fungal movement – surviving, growing, and thriving in hidden and often poor conditions – in interconnected mycelial networks. These mushrooms become what Despret (2013) called “companion-agents”, inciting actions that connect ordinary people in invisible rhizomatic networks; together they engender collaborative efforts and alternative possibilities in questioning and practising how to claim and sustain the commons.