i have never felt the need to make finite things more than i do now. everything is being driven by how much you create, by turning yourself into a specific thing to gain x metrics, by doing this and that just to be appreciated or highlighted by the algorithm. all of these constant changes and metrics chase, made us forget how to actually spend time with things. the reason i'm moving toward finite things is because the finitude of anything is what makes you intentional about the time you spend with it. it ends. right now, we scroll endlessly because there's no end to the "content". but if there were an end, i think we'd be more careful with how we scroll and with what we consume. and while it's easier to make finite things in the physical world, i believe they can be made in the digital world too, and that's something i want to explore more as well🌹

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the things we’ve been taught to spend our attention on are the ones that reward us back, or the ones that are “loud” but what if what asks the least is often what is holding the most? this is what i have learned, especially in my relationship with God, the Voice i never spent my attention on. until now “overlooked”🌹

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i wanted to make a zine for a long time, but i was caught up in too many other things and only ever gave it a second thought i needed a push to actually bring it to life, and i believe the algorithmic world we're living in turned out to be that push as i’ve had enough of always being asked for more but for less presence among other things, this zine is one of my first physical responses to the thing that asks us to consume mindlessly and create weightlessly🌹

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i am advocating for curation because it's one of the only ways to resist the algorithm, and i think one of the only things the algorithm can't do for us (theoretically). and when i talk about curation, i mean it on both consumption and creation. i feel like we are mostly talking about curation in consumption, but curation in creation matters more imo. what is there to consume if nothing is being made?🌹

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whether it is art, people, moments, or even ourselves, we give them, and everything, half a second now. we move so fast that nothing has the time to land, and we’ve gotten so used to the speed that we don’t even notice what we’re missing anymore. we hold the most powerful tools ever created in our hands and have access to more art, more beauty, and more truth than any generation before us. and yet, we scroll past it because we forgot how to stop. the thing is, art never stopped working. a piece was always able to make us feel something. but it needs time, and it needs us to choose to stay instead of swipe. the screen is blank because we made it blank. the choice was always in our hands. it still is. but they are “numb” now.🌹

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“what remains human when everything is being replaced” is the core statement that stays at the center of my work. even though my work involves a lot of technology, i believe the answer does not lie in a tool, not in something you can see or touch or taste, but in something that you feel. this is where everything i’m doing is basically centered🌹

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i don’t think anyone truly knows where social media is headed, and i don’t really trust anyone who claims they do. but i do think each of us has thoughts on it. more than anything, i feel like a lot of us are starting to move toward a complete refusal of everything we have been taught to care about online. i’ve put together my thoughts on what i find wrong with social media today and where i think it’s headed.🌹 https://thehiddeni.substack.com/p/the-future-of-social-will-be-intentional

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we think freedom is somewhere above us. we think that we need to climb towards something, to earn it, and then something else will be unlocked. but the truth is underneath. it always was. everything that sits on the surface is a seal that keeps us from what's below, where the light is. to be free, we first need to unbecome everything that was layered on top of us. to rise we need to descend. we need to unbecome to finally, be.🌹

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i’ve been spending a lot of time offline lately. i feel a bit lost about where i’m headed, so all i do is make art, work on the zine, read the Bible, and pray to find my path. this week i finished the last two essays for the zine and started working on the artworks that will be a part of it. the three essays that will be printed are by far among the best i’ve ever written. i’m not saying this to hype them up, but because they genuinely feel different. i felt a bigger sense of responsibility knowing they will be printed and sold, than just posted on the internet. this tension is actually something i write about in one of the essays. while the zine is many things to me, more than anything it feels like a fragment of myself. i’ve always wanted to bring together the ways i express myself, and this feels like that moment as the zine is where my writing and visual work finally meet. for now, i’ll keep focusing on the creative side. next week i’ll finish the artworks and hopefully the cover, then i’ll put everything together and print a sample. after that, i’ll figure out the rest. or maybe i'll just figure it out along the way🌹

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everything is infinitely accessible now. we are no longer intentional about what we consume, or about what we create. and these are two of the reasons everything feels so weightless. but nothing is going to make itself finite. it’s us who have to decide where things end. the cassette had less on it, and we heard more of it. scarcity was built into the object, so returning to it was the only thing you could do. there was no algorithm nudging you back. you went back because there was nowhere else to go. most scarcity now is artificial so we can still choose to make a thing ours by giving it the time it used to demand. we keep confusing more with better. but “less >>>” (is) more.🌹

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no one is whole on their own. every person still standing is being held by someone, even if they have forgotten who. and the question is not whether we lean on someone, because we all do, but whether we know who we are leaning on. for me, i know that it is God. “lean on”🌹

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i do believe that with everything that is going on, it will be really important for each artist to have their own place where they can build their own world. the first iteration of mine is now live. most of the things i’m going to experiment with will be added as single pieces to the puzzle i’m designing with the hidden i. i’m planning to take it irl as well. the zine i am working on is the first embodiment of that.🌹 https://thehiddeni.com/

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i’m at a weird stage in my journey where i have never felt a deeper urge to disconnect from everything than i do now🌹

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how much of what we think is still truly ours? “fed”🌹

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the reason why i think so many things we consume online feel so weightless is because we’ve turned creation itself into a form of consumption most of us are creating just to please an algorithm that can never be pleased, and no longer because we truly wanted to create that particular thing i agree that consumption is endless and weightless these days, but i think we are doing the exact same thing with creation🌹

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