Ann Hirsch
What A Cutie, 08.09.2020
What A Cutie is a video the artist's iPhone created from a collection of photos and videos the Los Angeles based artist Ann Hirsch took of her four month old daughter, Elisheva. This gesture examines technological automation in a time of public social identity. More specifically, how large media corporations such as Apple or Facebook, steal our information but soften the blow by giving us little presents like targeted ads, email word suggestions, or pre made videos we can share with friends.
Statement of the artist:
"And anyways, we thought the iPhone did a wonderful job of
grabbing the best content and putting it together in a way that really
celebrates the artist's daughter and makes our hearts swell. This video
is probably as good, if not better, than what Hirsch would make herself.
We're so often consumed with “surveillance,” “the blockchains,” and “online visibility” that sometimes we may not have time to appreciate the beauty of little babies. Now admittedly, we have some guilt over sharing this video (even though the artist insisted) because we think about Jeff Bezos and the Zuckerbergs and we wonder if they are going to steal these images of this poor baby and sell it to baby companies? Or to the government? Track her for the rest of her life? But then we decided not to dwell on that because the priority is having people see the artist’s baby. Also, we're only going to keep this video up for a month or so and then it'll be down so we won't be exposing Elisheva TOO much you know.
It's funny, ultimately, this art work has made us think! What is more important, for people to see the artist's baby or for people to see her art? Hmmm, we are not sure. Artist's egos are so fragile, often their sense of self worth gets caught up in their "babies;" whether that be their artworks or their actual children. It's a bit sad really that they can't separate themselves from them, but as an art institution, our job is to reinforce the artist's sense of self and let them know "You are important!"
Anyways look at this goddamn baby and tell me you're not obsessed!!! She’s special!!!!"
In her works Ann Hirsch looks at how identity is performed within popular culture and the web. She often investigates cultural shame and how it is applied to gender.