Sydney Smith hosts a solo exhibition examining #cursed images

Courtesy Sydney Smith

Sydney Smith, a local artist and graduating senior from the KCAI Fiber Department, will be giving their senior thesis exhibition beginning May 7 at the Vulpes Bastille gallery in the Crossroads.

Their exhibition, titled SH!TPOSTING is an exploration into online images and how they become culturally informative. But Smith isn’t exploring just any online images, they’re focusing on cursed images. 

“[Cursed images] tend to embody a kind of uncanny dream logic, like a glitch in the matrix,” Smith says. “If memes represent our collective consciousness, then cursed images represent our collective unconsciousness, our anxieties, epic fails, and worst nightmares. They are a reflection of our shadow selves, lurking in the dankest corners of the internet.”

Over a million images have been categorized as #cursed on social media, and Smith sets out to examine exactly how and why those images are deemed cursed. By recreating and recreating cursed memes, Smith shows how the images go from our minds to the internet, to the relegation of #cursed. 

SH!TPOSTING opens First Friday weekend, May 7, from 5-8 p.m., and will run until May 28. The gallery will be open Saturdays 1-4 p.m. or by appointment. Smith will be donating 25% of all proceeds from the exhibition to Black Rainbow. For more details, follow Smith on Instagram.