Blurred Life Images
The future realities created by the authors Dave Eggers and Margaret Attwood, investigate what might happen to humanity following our current trajectory. In Eggers ‘The Circle’, one company manages “all your internet activity in one easy, safe and visible place”[1] with alarming consequences. Attwood’s ‘Oryx and Crake’ trilogy envisions a post-apocalyptic future brought about by short term scientific decision making and the ‘Handmaids Tale’, also by Attwood, seems almost prescient considering Trumps rise to power.
On one level these potential futures and the current world perceptions of malaise and doom are intertwined with the consequences of technological advancement, however on a parallel level the pressure exerted by the ‘always on’ society combined with the truth and lies that being ‘always on’ exposes us to compels us to either rose tint reality, create illusions of sanctuary or withdraw.
This work explores themes of avoidance and seclusion and seeks to create a jarring of reality, a tension between two worlds, where the illusion we create and the harsh reality infringing upon it bleed into one another. A damaged illusion where we seek to shroud ourselves from the harsh realities of the world, recognising that whilst searching for the perfect retreat we may find ourselves imprisoned in our own illusion.
Blurred Life – Installation Videos
[1] Taken from the back cover of Dave Eggers, The Circle (London: Penguin Books, 2013).