Assignment 1 - Complete!

 

Before vs. After

Here’s my completed assignment!

- Written reflection -

For this assignment, I wanted to display the physical path of misinformation using a medium that’s becoming less and less common nowadays. I have decided to use a newspaper as my medium and have that circulated between my family members and myself. They could add things that related to the news story or the story I fabricated, changing its meaning entirely. This could mean “censoring” random names or adding the source picture of my face to every photo no matter what it’s about. I hoped to make this as ridiculous as some misinformation can be and display just how fast the meaning can be changed if you twisted the right words.

Because a wild lie/misinterpretation is a better story than the honest truth.

Will people take a closer look at the story underneath or will the surface level information capture their attention? 

Hito Steyerl’s “In Defence of the Poor Image” speaks about the distribution and availability of images. The economy of poor images allows for the participation of larger number of people who could use these images to further various agendas that aren’t always progressive. I was able to achieve this idea by literally “taking over” the media because the news can be very biased depending on the source. I copied and printed my photo on various types of printers (laser, thermal, etc.) then placed them over different news stories. I took over the National post, met with Mark Carney, became part of a champion league soccer team all in one day! I also added some things that annoy me personally to create more news.

The poor images become popular images because they are so readily available to others (like David Horvitz’s Mood Disorder project). The images can reflect the condition of the crowd and display what the audience craves whether that be fear, desire for creation, or just a distraction from the world. People want to be the co-creators of a new future through the circulation of various images as it gives them a sense of control over whatever they’re feeling in that moment.

My project was heavily inspired by the Onion (satire news stories) and I hoped it could be an interesting take on what’s happening with our neighbours to the south.