To begin with, please divide into small groups of 2-3 people.

Step 1

Each member within the group, please select 1-2 contemporary artworks related to digital identity from below and take a few notes here. You have 4 minutes for this activity.

1. “Selfie Harm” by Rankin: This is a series of photos created by the photographer Rankin, aimed at exploring the impact of selfie culture on individual identity on social media.

2. “The Influencers” by Richard Prince: Richard Prince’s works often delve into themes of the digital age. In “The Influencers,” he examines the construction of personal brands and digital identities on social media.

3. “Amalia Ulman’s Excellences & Perfections”: Amalia Ulman, through a fictitious identity on social media platforms, creates a social experiment about online virtual personas and real identities.

4. “Social Soul” by Lauren Lee McCarthy and Kyle McDonald: This piece combines social media and interactive technology, creating a personalized virtual entity using participants’ social media data, raising questions about digital identity.

You can also scan the QR code below to access:

Step 2

Group members, now share the themes and impressions of the artworks you just viewed. You have 5 minutes for discussion.

Step 3

Utilize Lambda (Blending AI Tool) to create a “Digital Identity Self-Portrait” by blending symbols representing your identity in the digital world. This could include your social media profile picture, blog cover, username, personal signature, frequently used emojis, etc. You have 5 minutes for this activity.

Blending AI Tool | Lamda (Stable Diffusion Model)

Lambda can mix provided images and text together using a fine-tuned Stable Diffusion model.

Memoji of Musen © 2023 by Musen Shao is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Try this source:

https://cloud.lambdalabs.com/demos/lambda/image-mixer-demo

If it doesn’t work, try this source:

https://huggingface.co/spaces/lambdalabs/image-mixer-demo

Here is a website for downloading emoji images, you might find it useful:

https://emojipedia.org

Tips: The results of the Stable Diffusion Model’s operation may not always meet people’s expectations. You can adjust the individual strength parameter for each input, which controls how big an influence it has on the output, until you deem the output image reasonable. Additionally, please note that when inputting text, the content should serve as instructions for generating the image rather than providing aimless descriptions.

Step 4

Take 1 minute to upload your self-portrait to Artwork Pool. Imagine this as posting content on a social platform like Instagram. Users usually accompany images with captions. Consider how you would caption this content and attach it to the left side of the image.

Spider-Man’s Multiple Digital Identity © 2023 by Musen Shao is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Step 5

Reflect on the theme of digital identity in the context of your self-portrait and the group discussion. Record your learning experiences in Notebook. You have 5 minutes for this activity.

Below are some questions for your reference:

1. Is your digital identity self-portrait in line with your expectations? Why?

2. Do you consider digital identity to be a static concept or a dynamic process? Why?

3. How has social media influenced the shaping of your identity in the digital space?

4. What connections do you see between your digital identity and your identity in real life?

5. In your opinion, what value does digital socializing bring to individual identity formation?

6. In the construction of your digital identity, did you perceive the diversity and complexity of identity?

Digital Identity Fusion: Artistic Reflection in the Digital Age © 2023 by Musen Shao is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 

(Cover Image Source: Lauren Mccarthy, Social Soul: https://cargocollective.com/lmccart/Social-Soul)

(Cover Image Source: Lauren Mccarthy, Social Soul: https://cargocollective.com/lmccart/Social-Soul)