SITUATION #59

This collection of images explores the representation of the body throughout current social media platforms. Hashtags like #beforeandafter or #genderlessnipples distribute the images across all channels, with body parts flooding the walls of Facebook and Instagram screens. Appearing on our smartphones and devices – ever closer and connected to our physical selves – these corporeal fragments affect us and infiltrate us subcutaneously. They validate and simultaneously negate our imaginary beauty canons, creating an unstable visual narrative of the flesh. Millions of pictures of abs, biceps and thighs circulate tirelessly, reinforcing aesthetic standards or creating counter narratives of resistance and protest. The flesh mutilated in the #scarification Twitter images clashes and argues against cosmetic surgery photos posted to Facebook by leading clinics. The shared #bodybuilding pictures disclose pumping muscles, while dick pics not only call for attention but ask to be critiqued on Tumblr. “Long live the new flesh”, alive and embedded in our every screens, too close for comfort.