Reflection
My first thought in producing a work with dialogue was to edit together screen recording clips of voice prompts on Hinge profiles. My initial idea of placing these voice recordings in relation to each other, to simulate a conversation between the men, didn’t pan out. I found it difficult to find voice prompts in the first place, let alone ones that would be harmonious in an edited conversation. So, I adapted my approach to have the dialogue to be less literal and more symbolic, between the audio of the men’s voice prompts and videos, mostly ones that I have taken and majoritively of women. The dialogue that I was trying to portray is up for interpretation, but I would say that the feeling it produces for me personally, is a commentary on how these men are trying to portray a part of themselves that will entertain the person viewing their profile and yet they are not garnering any response or attention from the people within the videos. For example, the voice prompt of a man humming a tune is lined up with a car crash on repetition; you can see my visual interpretation of the audio. The conversation that the men planned on initiating (flirting or what have you) is not the conversation that is taking place. I do not mean to mock these men, it’s more a comment on intent vs outcome; the men want the conversation to be between them and another person on Hinge, and yet the conversation is happening between my interpretation of their audio and women’s perceptions (girls being girls) But also it’s happening between their descriptions of themselves that I am relaying (and obscuring) to ChatGPT.
I feel that this aligns with Gronlunds (2014) concept that dialogic art is “trying to make [an] image of the internet” making visible “various invisible processes of communication.” (p. 13). That is to say that I am trying to make visible the experience that women have when they view mens Hinge profiles, individually or as a group activity, highlighting the notional nature of online opinions, especially on dating apps; “communication on the internet is both poly-vocal (multiple voices) and notional. ” (Gronlund, 2014, p. 8). I also just think it’s funny to play unrelated videos over the men’s prompts, changing their meaning or blocking them out entirely. I honestly learnt through this making that it is hard to place visuals to feelings, even though I didn’t put that much effort into this weeks experiment, it’s still hard to conceptualise what a feeling you experience would LOOK like.
I think the intent in my making and concept behind it was there, and strong maybe, but I don’t necessarily think it’s clear at conveying this message (especially without the reflection). I tried to go against my desire to make a “perfect” experiment and have left it be in it’s ambiguity, that being whether it missed the mark or not. I would love to further my exploration in realising online dialogues through a longer piece and filming new footage to represent it better. Given the time, I would like to leave behind using other peoples content and just take the time to shoot or scavenge my camera roll for the clips.
I said at the start of the studio that I wanted to create media that felt human, and I think going down the route of dialogic art would be such an aligned way to represent those feelings. Because being human is all about having conversations and making connections.
Bibliography
Emswats (12 May 2024) ‘mayhaps the most random edit ive ever made #dancemoms #fyp’ [TikTok], Emswats, accessed 12 August 2024. https://www.tiktok.com/@emswats/video/7367857534192897312is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7201716469485438466
Gronlund M (2014) ‘From Narcissism to the Dialogic: Identity in Art after the Internet’, Afterall: A Journal of Art, Context and Enquiry, (37):4-13, https://doi.org/10.1086/679372
OpenAI (2024) ChatGPT (GPT-4.0 version) [Large language model], accessed 18 August 2024. https://chat.openai.com/share/81f2e81f-f137-41b6-9881-39af1672ae3c