“Keep Looking Until You Find It”

Leigh Silverblatt

Keep Looking Until You Find It is a self-portrait study utilizing social media and augmented reality (AR), specifically Instagram face filters. I chose AR as a medium because I feel it's a very on-the-nose way to visually depict the time period in which we live; we’re constantly straddling a line between the digital and physical world. The series includes six different face filters. Each filter represents a word from the title. The text in this piece is obscured to the point of illegibility, just as the filters themselves obscure the subject's likeness. Does this give the words more or less meaning? Does an image of my face that is masked by my animations contain more of my “true” character? Or am I more hidden? These were things that I inwardly debated during the process of creating the series. The digitally manipulated representation of a person is more accurate in the sense that it's personally and “uniquely” curated by the individual. I could also argue that one's physical presence is their “true self,” as the characteristics can't be tweaked and altered as easily. Faults can't be hidden as easily. But, the longevity of my digital self will far surpass that of my physical self. My body will deteriorate, but my digital footprint, without any type of deliberate intervention, will remain unchanged forever. And generally, looking at a person's physical body doesn't tell you so much about their personality as, say, perusing their social media presence. But again, a lot is left out of a person's social media presence. It's an edited version of “the truth.” I'm not sure if I'll ever settle on a conclusion, other than, perhaps, Boolean logic does not apply in this case. Maybe our “true selves” just exist in a gray area somewhere in between.

You can find and use these filters on Instagram @leighsilverblatt.