Does what you wear, what you do and who you spend time with make you who you are? Jim Ron famously said, “you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” Are we merely empty canvases with potential to become unlimited possibilities?
If we can be anyone, why do we choose to be who we ‘think’ we are? Are we even choosing or simply falling into a comfortable identity? And how does daily repetition and external validation of one identity free or confine us? Can we be multiple people at once? Would society allow it?
In this series, I created one fictional character named Casabella Adrian, who has 10 different identities. Within each identity Casabella finds a community of people who can reinforce that identity in her, support and bolster it. In one identity she is a college professor, in another she is a nerdy schoolgirl, and another she is an electric guitar player.
As the artist, I used this hypothetical character as a means of giving myself permission to feel what it would be like to embrace multiple conflicting identities and explore the way in which each identity becomes a distinguished brand and stereotype that gives me a unique access to certain things.
This artistic project can only be with a Facebook account and by adding this character as a friend. By restricting the exhibition space to social media, I invite the audience to think about how “friends” contribute to shaping our identity and how we and our friends use social media to reinforce certain identities and minimise others.
