Facebook. The portrait of the “other-me” 2.0. 2012

The concept of “Society of Spectacle” introduced by Guy Debord in 1967 is still fully in force in its evolved version. We are speaking of the “Information Society” or, according to Manuel Castells, “Network Society”. Since the eighties, with the continuing development of digital technologies, virtual doubles appeared offering new strategies for socialization. Certain on-line social networking sites such as Facebook, highlight the role of photography as an essential constructor of virtual identities. This mass phenomenon is clearly present in a large variety of current debates and has not come without criticism in the art production. This artwork is composed by different light boxes that simulate computer monitors. The portraits are made by photographing the reflection of different faces on a computer turned-off screen. In the background, and melting with the portraits, we can find the profile pictures that these users have uploaded to Facebook. This way, I try to establish a duality between the human being that is in front of the computer and his virtual double that is behind the screen but melting both in a single image that leads us to raise questions about who is, in fact, the one who serves the needs of the other.