This intangibility of the body that accompanies the experience of
communicating on the Internet can leave one feeling a sense of
vertigo and a desire to remedy this loss of sensoriality. Here, the production of a new identity where all whimsies are permitted, this time in a physical realm, can be a most fantastical one. Here, also, the daily social pressures to conform to mediated beauty standards and eternal youth no longer have any recourse. Perfection is now possible and the machine assures the invulnerability and everlastingness of the body. Numerous Web works question this phenomenon while shedding light on the illusions dissimulated by desires that consists in deviating us from our definitive predicament common to us all.
Victoria Vesna, Bodies Incorporated, 1996
work review
Critical Art Ensemble, Flesh Machine, 1997 work review
