The Horror, the Horror In the work of Francois Roche, the archaic and the modern, nature and technology, the West and the Orient, myth and reality, intuition and calculation are intrinsically linked in rhizomatic chains that can be as material as they are associative. The objects and buildings Roche designs do not seem to have a classical one-dimensional purpose. Instead, they are part of stories. Sometimes objects are the protagonists of his videos; other times they appear almost parenthetically, like a McGuffin, in quasi-mythical contexts, guarded by people that seem as poor as they are wise. Bodies, animals, natural phenomena, things, and robots are all in a constant state of flux, a state of becoming. This essay was originally published in Harvard Design Magazine No. 42 –S/S 2016: Run For Cover!