The
Photographers Gallery have a freshly commissioned film for the digital Media
Wall by Joey Holder titled SELACHIMORPHA. It’s a screen based work, which
takes a particular sequence from the 1975 film Jaws as a means to look at the ways in which manipulated
images are appropriated and circulated by Internet culture as ‘fact’. The
scene, which shows a shooting star flaring behind hero Roy Schneider, has
become fodder for conspiracy theories. The ease of ‘adapting’ and then
distributing images – such as deserts, outer space and oceans – offers a rich
breeding ground for the fictional and make believe. Taking its name from a
scientific classification for sharks, this project morphs between factual and
fictional images, symbols and memes; exposing the continually shifting belief
systems we use to define our world. A brilliant part of the film is when Donald
Trump’s face morphs into Vladimir Putin and then finally into Pepe the frog, a
meme which was declared a hate symbol by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) after
its increased use by anti-Semites and white supremacists last year. This work
is a part of Conspiracy Week which
appears to be a part of a number of politically charged shows exploring and
responding to the current situation and increased confusion between fact and fiction
in a ‘post-truth’ world.
We’re
currently in the process of watching Westworld
which is an amazing series that takes place in a technologically advanced Wild
West-themed amusement park populated by androids. To attend the
park visitors are required to pay £40,000 a day and may indulge in whatever
they wish within the park, without fear of retaliation from the androids. It
presents big, bold questions about the nature of existence and reality while
carrying a gripping storyline. At one point one of the androids asks one of the
humans how they know if they are real and they reply with ‘I just know, I was
born and you were made’ and the silence that follows is full to burst with
tension and doubt from both sides of the dialogue. Watch it. Watch it now.
