Messages Of...

In 2014- 2016 I tried online dating on okcupid and experienced good dates, made some friends, but nothing real came out of the experience. Along the way I exchanged many text conversations that led me to the receive messages of love, lust, loneliness, confusion, and disgust. Which compelled me to explore the private inner workings of that experience. Leading me to the horrifying truth that in order find any kind of connection one must first go through a sea of unwanted #dickpics. Which were sent without warning or without request. Most women have been flashed in this aggressive manner on multiple occasions while trying to get to know a guy from an online dating site and the work is meant to create a simulation of this overwhelming experience. While working through layers upon layers of aggressive masculine identity the work morphed into photographic sculptures. The sculptures take on the form of a larger than life, 8x8x8, Valentine’s card. The use of the pop-up valentine card is a representation of the desires, hopes, and longing for connection that these dating sites promise. The heart, has been socially constructed to identify with love and romance. In my depiction the sentiments of affection are constructed on the outside while an overwhelming collage of conversations, pictures, and Internet memes take over the foundation of the sculpture. Creating a direct binary between fantasy and reality that makes people uncomfortable.