How do we challenge the way we currently consume imagery and interact with social media? And how do we make the public more conscious of their visual diet?
Marine went on for the quest.. with a desire to inspire and advocate for talented visual artists which can make a difference to the cultural sphere, Marine launched MTArt Agency in 2015, an award-winning business which champions artists by advancing and selling their works, funding studio space and providing cultural and promotional opportunities. Marine is also a mother of two, and now more than ever she considers how Imagery, like anything else, can be healthy or harmful, addictive or nutritious. In todays society this has become a massive issue with the huge cultural impact of social media.
During Marine TEDx Talk she spoke about ‘How social media visuals affect our mind?’. One day she decided to do a test. She posted a picture of her bottom in a bikini to her 24,000 Instagram followers. The post received 75% more views than usual – and most of the viewers were other women...
"Imagine if I was a 16-year-old girl. What would this tell me? It would tell me that my body is more valued than anything I could say, more valuable than, say, posting my exam results. Quite possibly it would mean I would put up more photos of my body to increase my profile.”
Tanguy pointed out that we live in a world where Kim Kardashian has 70 times more Instagram followers than the Louvre. Why does that matter? “Because she is producing overwhelmingly narcissistic, self-objectifying, highly sexualised imagery. She’s promoting unrealistic beauty standards, rather than enriching visual art, which is what the Louvre offers. We have a responsibility for who our role models are. We are the ones creating the demand for this narcissistic visual content. We are the ones to blame.” This is why Marine Tanguy founded MTArt Agency. While the art world concentrates on selling art on walls for a few, the agency focuses on investing in the top artists who could inspire everyone, with a content that is inspiring and valuable to all.
“My hope for art is that it will supply visual content that will change people’s philosophies, shake them up rather than keep them in their little bubbles as social media does.
Artbooks always provided me with a way to escape my own routine; they quickly became my door to new intellectual worlds full of exciting new ideas that were striking visually. And the point of what I do is to promote artists who do just that.” Teaming up with M&C Saatchi advertising agency & Rankin photographer, the three partners launched an initiative to see whether what we visually consume is as impactful as what we physically do. Visual Diet was the outcome of this question, delving into the abundance of images and the stream of infinite content to see how it all affects us. Aiming to promote a balanced visual diet, the campaign hopes to “prevent our audience binging on overly-processed, body- and mind-negative content.”
You are what you see. We are force-fed tens of thousands of images every day. Many of these homogenous, hyper- retouched, sexually gratuitous and highly addictive. We want to make people aware that, just like you are what you eat, what you see affects your mental health.
In other words we need to go on a visual diet. “A lot of us including our loved ones are spending five hours a day on social media sites such as Instagram, looking at the visual equivalent of junk food. No one would advocate eating junk food for every meal, but effectively that's what we're doing and it has consequences. But how can we empower the next generation to be more mindful of the visuals they consume?
I strongly believe in the positive value of inspiring visuals, especially the ones created by artists and I hope people start seeing the effect of these visuals on their mental health. It’s time to stop consuming daily the visual content of a Kim Kardashian and move over to a more inspiring visual diet.”
