Issue 12, Koyo Kouoh (Digital)

Visibility used to be - and for many people still is -  something to fight for. At the same time, it has increasingly become an obligation we are all expected to perform. Being seen, being public, is a duty that is extracted  from us. We must make ourselves legible and enjoy our exposure as freedom.

The boundary between public and private is difficult to define as both are steadily eroded. Our private lives are summoned into the open under the false pretence of authenticity; the grief and shame we perform prove that we are real. At the same time, public squares are sold, benches are redesigned to be inhospitable, libraries are forgotten, and the digital feed is promoted as their unicorn replacement. So what do we do? 

Withdrawal? No. Withdrawal is a solution sold back to us as a privacy setting. In the following pages, we explore the freedom of remaining illegible, even to ourselves, and consider the possibility of new publics.

Cover: Koyo Kouoh

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