The Internet provides individuals with an online ‘exhibition space’ where selective personal artifacts can be displayed and viewed, offering the unique opportunity to build an identity different from that presented in face-to-face interactions. Social media has become a medium/environment where individuals have the ability to define themselves through the construction and maintenance of a personal online profile. Online users now have the ability to ‘curate’ the presentation of their lives and subsequently their identities by filtering, amplifying and constructing personal displays that are described by Bernie Hogan as ‘a form of impression management’. This concept is exemplified through the artwork of Dutch artist Zilla van den Born, who expertly contrived photographs reflecting a 5-week holiday in Southeast Asia, to showcase the reality distortion that occurs on social media.

 

Playing on the use of the word ‘construction’ within academic literature concerning online identity, this website aims to parody the building of identity with elements of actual building construction. This digital artwork explores the common representations of ‘Self’ within social media i.e. photo uploads, status’ etc. Taking ideas from how children explore identity I have adopted a ‘mix and match’ approach to the to create multiple mix-matched and matched identities. I have employed construction materials and mini workmen to highlight the constructed nature of online identities. The structure of the artwork aims to draw attention to the subject of identity construction at a surface level, with the ‘mix and match’ approach representing the possibilities that revolve around ‘impression management’. 

 

 My aim is not to focus on the falsehoods of online identities but to highlight the exhibition nature of social media and the role the individual plays as curator in the attempt to elicit certain judgments and impressions from other members of the online community.