gretchen
Hacks systems of power with art, code, and glitter
CHAPTER 1
Portraiture
FACETUNE PORTRAITS
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The history of portraiture is rife with juicy stories that relate to how, if and who is painted..
"Who is paying and who is painting.”
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Portraits and the exercise of power have a deeply connected history.
FACETUNE PORTRAITS
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Even if you don't know the term "Facetuning" you know what I'm talking about. These image modifications popular on social media platforms like instagram and tiktok are even built into our iphone cameras and a popular setting on Zoom. They process to make us more beautiful, or at least more acceptable. They are normalizing, homogenizing, and controlling. They tend to compress human diversity into a single look known as Instagram Face.
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To what extent is facetuning a choice?
Most people may inflict it upon themselves but a peer-reviewed paper by Gretchen's studio with a summer 2024 publication date in EVA British Computer Society proves that by conforming to these algorithmic beauty standards platform users get increased exposure.
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References