Jason Zimmerman

This project, 100+ color laser prints of email responses, originated as a solicitation on craigslist.org. A short request for a supposed rape fantasy was posted in personals forums all over the United States—including New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C. The words “rape me” formed the bulk of the content. Nothing more was stated or implied beside a willingness to engage in some level of correspondence with willing, yet unwitting, and relatively anonymous respondents. An attempt to maintain the anonymity of those who choose to respond was made by redacting individual names, email addresses, or phone numbers, and in many cases; the faces, tattoos, and other physical identifiers present in attached images, were blurred or otherwise distorted.

Although the gathered responses, either presented in bound volumes or tacked to the wall in a large grid, constitute the physical substance of the project, it can also be considered that the project exists largely in the viewer’s reaction, and in resulting conversation. For the experience of this project to be meaningful, the viewer needs to approach it with an open-mind, however shocking the subject matter. In this environment discussions may be allowed to transcend the obvious, ranging from viewer’s thoughts on human fantasy (or more specifically sexual fantasy) and its impact on one’s perceived reality, to the complications of socially imposed moralities, or even to broader dialog circulating around how such topics play-out in the relatively new social dynamics created by internet technologies.

Tags: Photo

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