THE COLLECTIVE GLITCH
The Collective Glitch (2015-2018) utilizes imagery as data and creates a collective image through appropriation. This work looks at what would 15 different people's photographs look like when collected, deconstructed, and then woven together like the making of a tapestry?
I have spent the past three years exploring what makes a memory--what is a personal memory versus what is a created memory influenced by images or media provided from outside sources. For months I searched for a collective of individuals from all over the United States, whose ages spanned over multiple generations, and were from different socio-economic and cultural backgrounds to collaborate with me on this work. Once found, I requested ten images from “the collective”. Some were images they personally photographed, some were images they pulled off the internet, and some were from personal family archives, however, all the images were personal and intimate to them.
Utilizing a vertical version of Morse code as a visual matrix, I digitally weave the multiple data sources (the 15 photos from different people representing the same word) together to form a single, compressed image. Ultimately, I was interested if once combined, would the elements or information from all the images result or create something recognizable to that of the word originally given to the collective.
The Collective Glitch invites the viewer to consider imagery as data, draw upon their own cultural experiences to define the visual data being presented to them, and ask the question, in today’s society, is this what portrait/family/hero/birthday/home/tragedy/moment/fear looks like?
The Collective Glitch (2015-2018) utilizes imagery as data and creates a collective image through appropriation. This work looks at what would 15 different people's photographs look like when collected, deconstructed, and then woven together like the making of a tapestry?
I have spent the past three years exploring what makes a memory--what is a personal memory versus what is a created memory influenced by images or media provided from outside sources. For months I searched for a collective of individuals from all over the United States, whose ages spanned over multiple generations, and were from different socio-economic and cultural backgrounds to collaborate with me on this work. Once found, I requested ten images from “the collective”. Some were images they personally photographed, some were images they pulled off the internet, and some were from personal family archives, however, all the images were personal and intimate to them.
Utilizing a vertical version of Morse code as a visual matrix, I digitally weave the multiple data sources (the 15 photos from different people representing the same word) together to form a single, compressed image. Ultimately, I was interested if once combined, would the elements or information from all the images result or create something recognizable to that of the word originally given to the collective.
The Collective Glitch invites the viewer to consider imagery as data, draw upon their own cultural experiences to define the visual data being presented to them, and ask the question, in today’s society, is this what portrait/family/hero/birthday/home/tragedy/moment/fear looks like?