Abstract:
Screen technologies, ranging from the cinema to the smartphone, are taken
for granted in the contemporary screen landscape. This landscape has been referred
to as the “screen-sphere” (Sobchack 2014) owing to the fundamental ways screens
affect how people understand and relate to the world around them. It is particularly
their structural and operative functioning as interfaces that influence not so much
how we use screens, but, more importantly, how they affect our communication with
and feelings towards others. In so doing, the screen as an interface profoundly
transforms people’s capacity for empathy. This article exposes the intersection of the
screen and the face of the celebrity persona in an artwork by Candice Breitz titled
Love Story (2016). Since the installation focuses attention on the faces of its subjects,
it utilises the enormous power of the face in generating empathic responses. More
specifically, the face of the celebrity persona cultivates both fascination and
empathy in this work. Through a close analysis of this installation, I aim to show how
empathy can be controlled and manipulated just as much as it can be compromised
due to our screen-based day-to-day practices and our interactions with the faces of
others. This article also demonstrates the crucial role that an artwork can play in
raising awareness about the consequences of screens on our empathic resonance
with others.
