Edik Boghosian - PHRONESIS/ Participatory Performance

"Soundless" and "silent" are synonyms, although different in content. Social media's soundless noise is one of the most dangerous pollutions of modern life.

It is elementary to fall into the trap of this freedom of expression, where there are no standards, qualifications, or entry fees. Moreover, the unnecessary daily texts produced in massive amounts cause inconvenience, especially during the crisis. As a result, filtering and recycling have become vital necessities.

In this case, the Unfollow button is the initial lifeline. The artistic intervention is a way to escape and move on. The number of words left out due to filtering indicates redundancy, which will give us practical wisdom and prudence, phronesis, about the expression of our thoughts.

Performance Description

Screenshots of 10-15 of the authors' unfollowed friends on Facebook from the past few months are printed on paper (all texts will be anonymous). Then, all the words of the texts are separated with scissors to create a new text (the final text must have a lyrical/philosophical tone). This process can take several days, 1-2 hours a day, until the final text is fully formed.

Those who wish can join the cutting and text creation process. To increase textual randomness and unpredictability, the participants may bring a screenshot of their unfollowed Facebook friends' posts printed on paper (anonymous). The unfollow condition is mandatory (we believe the participant is not following the authors of those posts on social media). The irrevocable condition of participation is to maintain absolute silence during the working process.