2020
found Instagram images and Photoshop.
This series of found Photoshopped images mines public selfies by Instagram users who are recommended to the artist, highlighting the phenomenon of the so-called Instagram Face, which refers to make-up trends and cosmetic procedures and that play to the racial biases of the platform’s users and algorithms. A 2019 New Yorker article described these biases as “an overly tan skin tone, a South Asian influence with the brows and eye shape, an African-American influence with the lips, a Caucasian influence with the nose, a cheek structure that is predominantly Native American and Middle Eastern.”[1] In each portrait of the series, a black overlay leaves only the eyes of the subject visible, mapping the formulaic nature of these images, which are rooted in a distinctly digital performance of gendered beauty and self-exoticization.
[1] “The Age of Instagram Face,” Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker, published December 12, 2019, accessed June 8, 2020,https://www.newyorker.com/culture/decade-in-review/the-age-of-instagram-face.