Blue Gaze
2016
Created in collaboration with Aya Margulis at Doda Design Studio
Readymade IKEA FÄRGRIK white stoneware, Digital decals
The endless flow of staring faces that form Blue Gaze installation echoes the profusion of selfies flooding daily existence. The multiple plates display monochromatic self-portraits of public figures who frequently publish personal photographs on social media.
Each informal image portrays a seemingly mundane moment, while providing a luring illusion of intimacy to the millions of followers who receive it.
Referencing the historical role of ceramic wares as a form of cultural documentation, the installation inspects contemporary social patterns and asks what heritage the ceramic plates of the digital age should reflect. If self-documentation and the selfie phenomenon occupy so much of humanity’s time and attention, are they worthy of encapsulation in a tangible, fragile object?
To reflect the hasty and immediate nature of the selfies, the installation appears like a one-take piece, created in an automated, hands-off production line. Just as the selfies, the plates are somewhat insincere.
The hand-painted portraits were in fact rendered by an algorithm, the decal blue diverges from the familiar Cobalt, and the plates are deliberately a generic IKEA design.
