Discussion

Today, most of the world’s social interactions occur thanks to massive information networks that allow users to capture their identity on their virtual profile and expose themselves to the eyes of the world. While this often helps the masses keep up with a world that is advancing by leaps and bounds, this lends itself to many unwanted scenarios of deception and false self-esteem.

Sometimes we forget about how important is to be more interesting in real life than whoever you are on the internet.

When creating a persona in social networks, we rarely stop to think how much we want this new social network to infiltrate our lives. We do not know how much we are willing to share authentically and when we least think about it we are showing our Sunday breakfast to 600 strangers.

Technique

Collage in 32 Layers exposed to Style Transfer, color-filtered and re-processed with CNN to increase resolution.

From the artist

With this work I wanted to reflect our innocence and ingenuity when facing a tool as powerful on so many levels of our society as the internet is. We are barely intelligent apes that managed to create a network of shared knowledge, and now that we have managed to expand it to all the recesses of our daily life, we tenderly have the illusion of knowing what we are doing and where we are going.

As a sentient human being and observer of my environment, it is easy for me to notice that, as humankind, we are atrophying. When watching a sunset we prefer to take out the phone and see it through the screen, instead of simply marveling at the sublime vision that is presented to us. Sometimes we make a bigger effort to make a good post on social media than to support a loved one through a crisis. We create fake news to manipulate the masses, when the only effect they have is to confuse and illiterate.

We choose to ignore how ignorant they have made us.

The image shows the explorer crossing the threshold of the unknown that, ironically, is also full of gazes. A swirling and diffuse vision of a multicolored cosmos of possibilities that can amaze anyone with a pair of eyes. The innocence of Ikaro flying closer and closer to the sun, not knowing that his ignorance of the situation would cost him everything.

Models and references

Models

  • Aldo G. Dorantes (Ph.)