Thank you to everyone who came out to my show!
Monday, August 23, 2010 at 11:16AM A HOPED-FOR SELF:
CONSTRUCTING THE DIGITAL SELF-PORTRAIT
Social media including Facebook and Twitter are increasingly becoming ubiquitous vehicles for self-expression. No longer limited to the fine artist, today’s self-portraiture is designed by the masses as the new medium is available to anyone with access to the Internet. Many critics of the new medium blame this democratization of self-expression for creating an epidemic of narcissism, apathy and ignorance. A Hoped-For Self examines this digital and democratized self-portraiture and the related themes of identity construction, representation, narcissism, voyeurism and exhibitionism.
On social media sites, users create identities by mashing together a baseline of original content (personal photos, autobiographical information and short text-based comments) and a hefty dose of borrowed content (hyperlinks to online articles, music and videos, and lists of affiliations with groups and individual acquaintances). Though often fragmented, these profiles become representations of the individuals who created them. The construction of these digital self-portrayals is a dialectical process, as personal values and beliefs are revealed through the careful selection, creation and presentation of visual and text-based elements. For the most part, individuals present themselves as accurately as possible, while consciously minimizing flaws that other users view as undesirable and exaggerating qualities that others find desirable. The self most often presented through most social media sites is neither a true self nor a false self, but instead a “hoped-for self,” a socially desirable self one wishes to present to others and ultimately would like to become.
