The Future Ahead, 2014
HD Video, 16' 22''
Still of The Future Ahead. Courtesy of the artist
Video technology makes it possible to reflect on images while they interact with one another in the body of the narrative. Removed from the dialectics of cinema, digital editing allows the text to be reassembled, to be put on hold and even go backwards. This new landscape was undoubtedly a prequel of the Internet realm, where space and time have definitely taken on a different meaning. In her work, Amalia Ulman connects this new narrative horizon with the hyper-design of bodies at a time when plastic surgery is one of the keys to understanding culture today. From designing the environment to designing ourselves, through the changing image of the pop icon Justin Bieber, this essay highlights how identities are no longer constructed in a fixed manner, but are in constant transformation, revealing interesting vanishing points. Image and consumerism are at the very heart of the struggle to colonise the body.
