About the Exhibition
In December, 2016, #florence” opened at NYU Florence. #florence” is a video installation by Harshini J. Karunaratne that examines images posted to Instagram that are hashtagged ‘Florence’. Hundreds of images of Florence are posted everyday on Instagram alone, and thousands of hashtags along with them. The use of the hashtag, indicated by a word following the ‘#’ symbol, was intended to group posts together in order to easily locate specific content. However, hashtags are often generic, limiting, or simply do not provide any sense of context to the image.
This installation detaches the hashtags from their images in order to examine the words associated with the city. What image of the city is evoked from #s alone? How do #s enrich or devalue the city? The installation also composites photographs of the city taken by the artist in order to reflect on the value of image making at a time when similar kinds of images are easily created, shared and consumed.
About the Artist
NYU Florence student Harshini J. Karunaratne is a Sri Lankan-Peruvian pursuing Film & New Media and Theater at New York University Abu Dhabi. Her background is initially in photography, having began photographing sports in 2010 before using the camera to document the vibrancy of her home country, Sri Lanka. Her later photographic work has been been centered on the importance of places and spaces in relationship to the self. Currently, Harshini´s primary focus is in using technology to bridge the gap between film and theater. Aside from film work, her interests include performance art, projection mapping, video installations, VJing, and creating audio-visual work. In November 2015, Harshini performed ´Existential´ at NYU Abu Dhabi, a projection mapping-based live performance that explored what it means to be from two different places and how perceptions of the ´self´ are influenced by the ´other´. It was based on the idea of being ´interrogated´ with questions that seem simple by nature, but have complicated answers. Harshini has previously interned for the Akkasah Center for Photography and is presently working with the newly founded Dhakira Heritage Center based in Abu Dhabi.