Description
Body of Work is an exhibition of printed and video-based artwork that explores identity in the digital age. We find ourselves in an era where we are constantly bombarded with information and opinions from millions of perceived others. It becomes increasingly hard to not only contain, retain, or even question all this information we are receiving, but it can also force one to confront how they perceive their own identity. A person’s identity is now amalgamated by immense swathes of people across multiple platforms, further curated by algorithms working behind the scenes. It becomes increasingly hard for the viewer to get a sense of who they might be when they do not conform to the standards generated by these platforms, and one might do drastic things in order to match these arbitrary standards. Graphic design is a practice of information management, controlling and gatekeeping the massive amounts of content we face in our time. And in this time, graphic design can either help to perpetuate the standards and false realities that social media help generate, or it can fight against them. And the use of branding is a particularly helpful tool in design as a means to keep a message constant and to communicate values effectively. Graphic design is, however, a mostly commercial practice, so it more often than not helps perpetuate these standards to help further fuel capitalist enterprises, and branding is too often associated solely with advertising. It is with these visual art pieces included in the exhibition that these notions are questioned, and challenge the viewer to be more critical of their identity in this time of endless content. These four pieces included in this exhibition are the art book On-Brand Identity Guidelines, the installation The Moment, the video-based installation #gaysofinstagram, and the short experimental film Consider Yourself. The art exhibition for Body of Work was held at the Everett Gee Jackson Gallery in the School of Art and Design at San Diego State University from April 12 through April 14, 2022.
