Doomscrolling, 2020
Doomscrolling (or doomsurfing) is the act of consuming an endless procession of negative online news, to the detriment of the scroller's mental wellness. In the heart of the pandemic in 2020, doomscrolling became an endemic issue. The social isolation combined with endless internet scrolling resulted in addictions to overconsumption, restless nights, depression, anxiety, and fear.
The emotional highs and lows of doomscrolling are brought on by social media feeds which juxtapose Covid-19 headlines with cute cats and images of war from the other side of the world with photos of friends and family. This video artwork attempts to capture some of the disorder of this uniquely pandemic-era internet experience by jumbling up incoherent narratives and in-between emotions.
In this 30 second looping piece, sound-bits play and are cut off short as cartoon clips and cats are mixed with videos of atomic bombs, forest fires, and more. All the media used meditates on the fear and anxiety present in early 2020 when we were stuck at home with our own internal and eternal thoughts. While doom seemed to be present outside in the world, doom also brew internally within us.