Jill Walker Rettberg (2014) – Serial Selfies .........................................................................................2
Key concepts ........................................................................................................................................2
Short summary of the text ....................................................................................................................3
Summary of the text .............................................................................................................................4
, Jill Walker Rettberg (2014) – Serial Selfies
Rettberg, Jill Walker. 2014. “Chapter 3: Serial Selfies”. In: Seeing Ourselves Through
Technology: How We Use Selfies, Blogs and Wearable Devices to See and Shape Ourselves.
Springer Open. (32-44)
Key concepts
Introduction:
- The text discusses the exhibition ‘LifeLoggers: Chronicling the Everyday’ at the
Elmhurst Art Gallery in 2014.
- It focuses on artist Suzanne Szucs, who took daily Polaroid photos for 15 years as part
of her art project.
Suzanne Szucs’s Project:
- Szucs’s project emphasized quantity and rhythm, taking a photograph every day, using
an instant Polaroid camera, and adding a few words or a sentence to each photo.
- The photos covered a wide range of subjects, including mundane, emotional, and
unconventional images.
- Szucs’s project predates the Instagram era but shares similarities with today’s digital
selfies, offering a glimpse into daily life and the passage of time.
Cumulative Self-Presentations:
- Digital self-presentation is cumulative, consisting of continuously expanding
collections of posts, micro-narratives, comments, and images.
- The text highlights the influence of cultural and technological filters on self-
representation in digital media.
Time-Lapse Selfies:
- Time-lapse selfies gained popularity with Ahree Lee’s and Noah Kalina’s videos posted
on YouTube.
- Kalina’s video, titled “Everyday,” inspired many similar videos in this genre.
- The text examines the differences in reception and comments on Lee’s and Kalina’s
videos, which may be influenced by gender and race.
Artistic Precedents:
- Various artists, including Karl Baden, Eleanor Antin, and Tehching Hsieh, engaged in
daily self-portraiture projects before the digital age.