The Maze of Media

Presenter: Dylan Myers

Presenter Status: Undergraduate student

Academic Year: 20-21

Semester: Fall

Faculty Mentor: Sakina Bryant

Department: Philosophy

Funding Source/Sponsor: SYRCE Symposium

Screenshot URL: https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1UY3H-MpspjSfyQkJ5JdYkJDAeuLsITFh

Abstract:
The maze of media is based mostly on Jean Baudrillard’s belief that access to unlimited information, because of modern media, led to the creation of a hyperreal reality which we all participate in whether we know it or not. I show a line of kids headed into this maze and from their perspective, all they can know is to follow the person in front of them. From an outside perspective the viewers can see the billboards with breaking news as well as a representation of the NASA space shuttle explosion, broadcasted live on CNN in 1986. My main idea behind this picture is that someone who becomes lost enough in the maze will have no sense of any reality other than what’s being fed to them through the billboards. You might imagine that eventually the maze wouldn’t matter anymore and the man could go about his life feeling connected to the events in the world from a distant position because they see the maze and the billboards as the world. I would like to provoke viewers to reflect on their own lives and question if we are just stuck in a maze of systems like work, school and consuming media, moving mindlessly through the paths constructed by the examples of those around us because we have actually neglected to realize that we are in the maze.