mediascape

mediascape is an exploration of the prevalence of nostalgia in contemporary art. When making this project, I myself was overtaken by nostalgia as I was inspired by the frutiger metro aesthetic of the early 2010s. I found myself asking myself, why am I so drawn to nostalgia? Why do we as artists seemingly return to the past for inspiration? 

By returning to the past, there is a certain familiarity and comfort in what is known, in retaliation against a future that seems unknown, hopeless, and desolate. But how can we consume art from the past without merely replicating it? How can something new emerge from what is already known?

By translating the frutiger metro aesthetic into a three-dimensional space, mediascape explores how the past can be critically expanded rather than simply referenced. Art is always in remediation, continuously reshaped by shifting technologies and cultural conditions. Nostalgia, then, is not something to reject, but something to interrogate, to examine what was once technologically successful, what failed, and how those lessons can inform new art.

Nostalgia will always influence artists. But when is too much nostalgia, too much? I revel in the uncertainty.