KILL MEMORIES

“In the future, identity will become the most valuable entity in
the future and will exist as genuine in the virtual world.”
Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen, The New Digital Age. Reshaping the
Future of People

“Seen as the pinnacle of the digital world by its founders, Google is an infinite source of images for Sergen Şehitoğlu. He created two out of three of his new photography series, titled “Kill Memories”, “Google Street View” and “Mt. Paektu” with material he found on Google. In our current, post-Internet age, Sergen Şehitoğlu deconstructs the usage of these technologies, in which the drive for surveillance and a talent for ubiquity are dominant. It is a matter of desire to see and be seen. Therefore the distinction between the public and private spheres is becoming ever more fragile and in terms of the control of images, as well as the creation of personal data or archives, privacy is undergoing an extensive change. Following, sharing, capturing, giving spoilers, watching and storing become inherent acts of this omnipresent network which is at the origin of renewal of relationships. Sergen Şehitoğlu questions the circulation of images that seep through the filter of the Internet and of the production process which oscillates between exposure and reformation. Departing from our efforts to correspond our memories with their visual representation, he reframes the images in question and he reworks them by shifting their perspective. He presents his own thoughts about the image by re-appropriating major photographicstyles –studio photography, photojournalism and street photography. Straying slightly from modernist aesthetics, these three new series possess a common denominator: the computer –a machine that records and produces visual content through its interfaces, such as webcams or the cameras placed atop Google cars.”

Marianne Derrien, Independent curator and art critic