Through The Looking Glass
Team Members: Jana, Amélia, Shinaaz, Robert
Abstract:
“Through The Looking Glass” strives to represent the bizarre mindset of defamiliarization by using various methods of (de)construction, punctuated with contrasting expectations of humour and horror that can arise from this way of viewing the world. By reconceptualizing the numbing sensation of dissociation as actually being​ full​ of generative potential, our project consists of multiple “mini-works” which form a whole. Each one has its own take on overarching themes—the gaze, (dis)embodiment, trickery, anticipation, and performativity—and transmutes these recurring threads through its own decisions about format, colour, associations, and visual vocabulary.
While all routes eventually lead to the same “resolution”, which ultimately reveals the underlying structure, this choice does not represent a narrative conclusion so much as it is an affirmation of the linkages between recurring subjects and themes. ​The further that the viewer traverses across layers, the more specific-yet-abstracted the common concepts become. Rather than achieving cathartic clarity, the viewer is consistently reminded of their own expectations of “progress” when faced with yet another clickable portal. Overall, this plurality of possibilities actualizes our chosen understanding of defamiliarization; that it is a mindset in which core content is progressively “disintegrated ​through ​a process of generative association”.
