Media Study and Illustrations: Ceci n’est pas une image

Analyzing social media from the lens of affect theory.

Problem Statement

Create a creative project that explores affect theory in the context of social media.

My Role

I conceptualized, researched and illustrated the project.

Goals

Develop an understanding of affect theory.
Research its relevance with respect to social media.
Construct a synthesis statement and a creative project to demonstrate said relationship.

Project Overview

Ceci n’est pas une image, is a play on René Magritte’s, Treachery of Images. Similar to the painting, the zine explores the power of social media as more than an image on a screen, more than a window into someone’s life. It tells the point of view of a freer generation, many years after the advent of social media that knows of these apps only through the stories their elders have told them. Ceci n’est pas une image is a commentary on the codependent relationships we have developed on these apps that are slowly but surely changing our self perception and ideas about self worth. While it looks to highlight dysmorphia, the pressures of going viral and being popular it also aims to create a more hopeful note of victory of the human spirit, through the narrator. Ceci n’est pas une image suggests a world with a more critical reflection on its interaction with social media platforms and each other. While it doesn’t advocate for abstinence, it asks the viewer an important question- “What are we looking at and how does it affect us?”

Timeline

October 31, 2021 - November 21, 2021

Tool Kit

Procreate

What I Learnt through the project

This project helped me develop a critical lens through which I could analyze our relationship with social media. It also helped me understand illustrative elements, storytelling and practice academic research to create fact based arguments that could support my hypothesis for my synthesis statement.

WHAT IS AFFECT THEORY?

Affect theory is the media theory that describes the ability to change or be changed. It attempts to describe the relation and interaction between two bodies or objects that transform each other in some way. Some questions my coursework encouraged me to ask were:

How do we come to identify with another? How can media make us feel like we are touched and changed by its presence?

Interaction and engagement of the user constantly change how social media behaves and the reverse is also true. Social media changes our ideas, perceptions and can even change how we view ourselves. In keeping with this theme, I thought it would be an interesting exercise to share a dystopian perspective on social media with the viewer. I chose to name the zine as an ode to René Magritte’s work because I wanted to communicate that everything is not as it seems. The cover of the zine, is a play on his work titled The Son of Man, where I replaced Magritte with Sir Issac Newton and his apple. This was a nod to Newton’s third law of motion, which serves as a perfect one line summary for affect theory. Click through the zine below to experience this work.