THE PROBLEM WITH ‘FEMINIST’ INSTAGRAM

Posted on January 31, 2021 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged Carmina Masoliver, cecilia nguyen, chnge, feminism, feminist, Instagram, itsfeminism, jacob castaldi, march, sam sedlack, social media, tanner sweitzer, womxn.

by Carmina Masoliver

In December, I found out that the Instagram account, simply titled ‘feminist’ is run by two cis-gender white men: Tanner Sweitzer and Jacob Castaldi.

Accounts like ‘feminist’ become popular by reposting relevant content from others without creating their own. This means they have more time to simply put out more content. The focus of the account revolves around it being relatable to their target audience, and so part of the responsibility also falls with us as the audience, to make sure we follow the tagged content creators, supporting them rather than simply ‘liking’ posts, and interrogating who is behind such popular accounts when that transparency isn’t there.

THE MYTH OF THE MILLENNIAL

Posted on May 6, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged avocado toast, bloggers, clickbait, Community, conservative, cp, diverse, educated, entitlement, featured, generation, generation y, Instagram, internet, labels, liberal, millennials, myth, narcissistic, pet peeve, pm, political correctness, racist, satire, socialist, student debt, traits, work.

by Jonathan Lee

Ten Things Every Successful Social Justice Blogger Does.
Exasperated Writer Was About to Give Up, What Happens Next Will Have You In Tears!
The Five Worst Millennial Clickbait Headlines That You Just Won’t Believe.

Horrific isn’t it.

I was recently asked what my biggest pet peeve is about the way people talk about my generation. Perhaps the phrase pet peeve is one of my pet peeves. Maybe the fact that even the words – pet peeve – make me cringe, may say something about me and my reluctant membership of Generation Y.Continue Reading

FREELANCE STRUGGLES: #SINKTOBER

Posted on October 16, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged art, artists, digital artist, freelancers, graphic designer, illustration, illustrator, inktober, Instagram, Jake Parker, October, Sara Harrington, sinktober.

by Sara Harrington

Read Part One of Freelance Struggles here.

‘Freelance Struggles’ aims to vocalise and explore the realities of working as a creative freelancer in amongst a world of ‘nine to five-ers’. By collating a diverse array of stories from a variety of creative professionals this series hopes to contextualise the working art world and give space to discuss what it really means to become your own boss.

Along with its cooler weather, cosy knit-threads and overpriced pumpkin-flavoured beverages, October’s changing of the seasons includes the the seeing in of ‘Inktober’ for online artists. The worldwide challenge originated with the artist Jake Parker, who wanted to improve his inking skills and set himself the challenge of creating a new, fully inked drawing everyday for a month. The initiative has been incredibly successful on Instagram, where users share and support other artists and encourage each other to keep up with the challenge.

My illustration, ‘Sinktober’ highlights the sinking feeling of the list that keeps growing, the unattainable aspirations and goals you set yourself and the never ending deadline. It’s the restless feeling of carrying too much in what feels like the wrong direction. It’s the friends that you do not see, the family you have not called, and the many projects you did not say no to.

Featured image by Sara Harrington. It shows a person carrying several bags full of stuff whilst towing an indignant dog – the notations identifying the stuff being carried as the person’s workload and stress

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REVIEW: THE CIRCLE, BY DAVE EGGERS

Posted on July 15, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged adaptation, amazon, Apple, book, buzzwords, Community, company, connectivity, corporate progressiveness, data, Dave Eggers, derrida, dystopia, Emma Watson, facebook, film, Foucault, Google, harassment, human perfectability, human rights, Instagram, James Ponsoldt, John Boyega, marketing, morality, movie, panopticon, privacy, private, public, reading, rebel, review, sharing, social media, The Circle, Tom Hanks, transhumanism, transparency.

by Eli Lambe

Dave Eggers’ The Circle, both the book and the recent feature-length adaptation, is a dystopia formed around a Facebook/Apple/Google/Amazon-esque corporation, one which hosts and shares almost every aspect of its users lives. The novel does a remarkable job of capturing the subtle ways in which this model is marketed to us, how this format of data-as-product is often shrouded in apparently progressive buzzwords – community, accountability, transparency, participation – whilst the company which operates under this model does so under the same values as every other corporate entity.

There is a veneer of progressivity and respectability that companies adopt in order to retain and gain customers – like Facebook making it easier to harass trans people, or implementing guidelines that protect white men but not black children, and at the same time, for one month of the year, patchily providing a rainbow “pride” react to the users who liked lgbt@facebook. Perhaps not as extreme as Eggers writes in The Circle, but eerily close enough: “Anytime you wanted to see anything, use anything, comment on anything or buy anything, it was one button, one account, everything tied together and trackable and simple, all of it operable via mobile or laptop, tablet or retinal.”Continue Reading

EVERYDAY DOUBLETHINK – ONLINE LIFE AND ALTERNATIVE FACTS

Posted on January 28, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national, Perspectives and tagged 1984, alternative facts, backfire effect, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, doublethink, facebook, fake news, George Orwell, Instagram, internet, Kellyanne Conway, newspeak, online identity, post-truth, Sean Spicer, SnapChat, social media, technology, USA.

By Sam Naylor

Kellyanne Conway has been making headlines this week. Sent out to explain away Sean Spicer’s bizarre comments regarding the crowds at Trump’s inauguration, she said “we feel compelled to go out and clear the air and put alternative facts out there”. Alternative facts, huh? How’s this:

Last week saw the inauguration of the 45th President of the United States of America, Bernie Sanders. As the world witnessed the honesty and good intentions of the new administration firsthand over the next few days, sales of George Orwell’s 1984 surged (it sold out on Amazon). Commentators were broadly bemused. Why, with a president of unparalleled frankness ascending to the Oval Office, was a narrative of lies and alternative facts, paradoxes and doublethink, a story of a nation which unashamedly proclaimed “War is peace, Freedom is slavery, Ignorance is strength”, becoming so popular?

SOCIAL MEDIA, APPROPRIATION, AND THE ART WORLD.

Posted on June 30, 2015 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged appropriation, art, art gallery, arts, Frieze Art Fair, Instagram, modern art, Richard Prince, social media.

by Jess Howard

Artistic appropriation is in no way a new phenomenon. Painters and sculptors have been reproducing their own versions of classic art works for centuries. Picasso for instance, took his own stance in the 1950’s when he appropriated Eugene Delacroix’s The Women of Algiers, by painting the women from behind. And Andy Warhol famously lost a lawsuit in the 1960’s over the design of his Flowers piece. But how does the art world address this kind of appropriation when an image has been sourced directly?

Last month Richard Prince, no stranger to appropriation, caused controversy with his New Portraits exhibition, by displaying a series of images in the Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles that he had directly taken off of Instagram. There was no editing, no unique angle, and no form of reproduction. He simply blew the images up, added one last comment, and hung them in gallery. They then proceeded to sell out at the Frieze Art Fair, with the pieces reaching over £56,000 each. This brings into question the idea of possession and identity, both on the internet and within artistic expression. If you place images on a public forum, do they automatically become public property?Continue Reading

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THE MYTH OF THE MILLENNIAL

FREELANCE STRUGGLES: #SINKTOBER

Read Part One of Freelance Struggles here.

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