Tarek Fahmy: Cultural Critic

My Facebook profile image has become a digital canvas of sorts. My profile pictures are almost always doctored in photoshop. At times it’s just a traditional self portrait. In some instances I created a digital montage instead of the traditional self portrait.

Cindy Sherman and Lucas Samaras come to mind while looking at these portraits. They both utilized their own visage in their work. Cindy’s work was more of a cultural critique concerning women’s role in society and Lucas was more of an introspective artist, looking inside himself to explain existence in a sense.

I have a history of drawing and painting portraiture so this comes naturally to me. Below is a selected few of my ‘Facebook Profile Portraits’.

The following semi-doctored and color corrected screenshots are of the World Cup finals that took place yesterday in South Africa (07.11.2010) between the Netherlands & España.

The selected images were carefully chosen to tell my narrative of the match; the side that believes that the Dutch played borderline aggressive/dirty the entire match and were lucky they weren’t given more red cards (disqualifications) throughout play.

This continues my blog series entitled ‘Postmodern: I Take Pictures of Pictures‘. This time i chose the world cup finals match using ESPN’s highlight video footage.

The Red Card (The Ejection)

THE GOAL

This time it’s Fiona Apple’s old school video for the song Limp. I find her so captivating because of her physical beauty combined with her musical and lyrical talents. It’s too bad that she dropped out of the music world for whatever reason(s). Maybe her ‘James Dean syndrome’* got in the way.

* James Dean syndrome is how I personally describe this state of mind that generally afflicts adolescent folks that is characterized by a brooding, pseudo depressing, and an anti authoritarian sensibility.

Some grow out of it after they go to college while others seem to be stuck in it for life. Maybe Fiona fits the latter but I really did not research her story and why she dropped out of the music world.

The following doctored, color corrected, and manipulated screen-shots are from her video for the song Limp. Afterwards I will also provide the link for this pretty decent and off-course pseudo angry tune.

I have noticed recently that I have been taking pictures of pictures (still or moving). Whether the pictures that I take are from a computer screen (Youtube + Websites), a street billboard, or moving images (theatre + TV), It seems like I have been reproducing reproductions. I am taking a picture of a picture and making a new image.

At times I don’t even use a camera, I use my Apple’s screen capture feature to take pictures from Youtube videos and other video websites. I then import these images into Photoshop and tweak them to my liking. I crop, color correct, and at times totally change their ‘genetic’ make-up and make them my own.

With the Internet, Youtube, and the blogosphere (there are countless of images that saturate the web) it’s easy to appropriate other people’s images and make them your own. It’s the age of digital and algorithmic recycling. At the same time, i don’t mind when my images are appropriated and are used by others; as long as a profit is not being made from this borrowing/appropriating/stealing.

I am just a small piece of the grand puzzle because my reproduced reproductions eventually will be reproduced by someone else and then these reproductions of reproductions of reproductions will be reproduced again and again, ad infinitum.

UX design means user experience design. These designers literally design the experience that the end-user (person using the web-site or application) will have online or on the desktop.

When websites and desktop applications are being designed, the end-user should always come first. This is called user centered design. Since different applications/websites have a different archetypal end-user(s), a user experience designer has to determine what type of design appeals and is more efficient to that particular archetype of an end-user(s).

The experience designer also delves into information architecture, user interface design, art direction (over-all aesthetic feel & vibe of site/application), branding, usability studies, story boarding and wire-framing, research, client interaction and client presentation,

As of late there are many different terms being used to describe these designers. Some of the terms being used are:
• Visual Designer
• UX Designer
• UI designer
• Information Architect

In my opinion, the best UI/UX designers are the post modern equivalent of renaissance artists; versed in many seemingly disparate but truly interrelated disciplines. These UI/UX designers combine logic, creativity, and communication on a day to day basis. They are versed in psychology, usability, graphic design, fine arts, as well as wireframe rendering and story boarding. These designers also have the ability to put themselves in the end-user’s shoes.

UX design is a growing field that is extremely integral in today’s business. The ceiling is high and the future is bright.