About
Life Sharing is done by Eva and Franco Mattes in 2000, to turn their private lives into public artwork.[i]
Whatever that is in their computer, is available for view, copy and download. Be it the files inside, personal emails, bank statements and even their own photos. By anyone.
screenshot of their work from their website http://0100101110101101.org/life-sharing/
Moving Further
Even though the reading Webcams: The subversion of Surveillance by Dixon in 2007 revolves around the webcam, some ideas from it can be seen reflecting what this work talks about the private and the public.
Making it fully open to the people on the web, it also brings about a kind of
“new type of exhibitionism, or self-disciplinary device .”
denoting
“the idea of authenticity and “a trusted reality,” “
-Dixon, Webcams: The subversion of Surveillance, page 445
No doubt, people would be
“captivated by the potential of witnessing something uncensored, no matter how banal.”
-Dixon, Webcams: The subversion of Surveillance, page 446
However, is it really authentic and real? Similar to the webcam, there is alway this conscious, if not, subconscious thought to
“anticipate the looming presence of the global viewer.”
and things can be
“easily manipulated and falsified.”
-Dixon, Webcams: The subversion of Surveillance, page 446
What is present on the site can be true, but it also have that possibility of being false.
Which brings us to what the reading also mentions
“liveness is synonymous with the real”
-Dixon, Webcams: The subversion of Surveillance, page 445
The open source of the web to the public from something so private entices people to engage with other people, and not confine self to their own space.
However the sharing and liveness that these platforms does not really equate to reality, but rather just a catalyst for people to come out of their own space.
In their website, Eva and Franco Matte stated
“Unlike social networks, which didn’t exist at the time, its focus was sharing”
-Eva and Franco Matte, http://0100101110101101.org/life-sharing/
but in a sense, what social media shares may not be as far off as what they are sharing. It’s just how much content is being censored.
[i] taken from Life Sharing by Eva and Franco Mattes