Weblink: The Smiley Project
http://thesmileyproject.tumblr.com/
When you use the smiley face emoticon on MSN, Facebook, or even in your text messages, are you really smiling? When you see it in advertisements, on billboards, slapped across the front of t-shirts, what does it mean to you? Since its birth, the smiley face symbol has undergone various transformations. It has been appropriated time and time again, and has, as a result, become a pop culture icon. Originally seen as a universal symbol of happiness and innocence, the smiley face has been warped in recent years by dark visual designs that have given it new and creepy connotations. It’s now ubiquitous presence in new media has raised questions about the true meaning of the face. In today’s culture, it is used for all sorts of purposes: to convey irony, laughter, sarcasm, joy; to indicate a joke; often just to fill in the gaps in an online conversation. The question is: how do you use the smiley face and what do you think it has come to mean?
The Smiley Project is a web site that explores these questions through creative expression, adding its own layers of meaning to the symbol through abstract narratives. It invites you to weave through the fragmented narratives that highlight both the history of the smiley face and its current place within popular culture and digital media.
Credits
This project was created by:
Elise Anderson
Michael Mouritz
Jasmine Roth
Special Thanks to:
Garner Auwearter
David Danaci
Paul Glacherio
Kyla Brettle
Tags
Alert Moderator
Comments
1 comments
More Work by smiley_project
-
Weblink: The Smiley Project
1
Tags
12.06.09 — Natasha Mitchell
(Note to wider public - these comments should be taken in the context of this being a university class exercise! These RMIT projects are very sophisticated, and we welcome much simpler and entirely amateur contributions to Gene Pool too!).
Hi team (Elise, Michael and Jasmine)
This project made me....smile. Not in an ironic emoticon kind of way, but really. I loved the idea for this project - digging into the underbelly of a seemingly innocent popular icon. It's a great idea for a film doco too I reckon.
Some brief comments:
- Nice use of vimeo/tumblr for display.
- really enjoyed the creative, playful pictorial narratives and narrations on Leaping into the Unknown (well crafted, lovely pics) and The Face At the End of the World
- Thought the sound mix could do with a tweak on the Face a the End of the World yarn. The narration feels a bit loud compared to the rest of the mix, and it'd be worth really pacing your read - it's a bit mumbling/muffled - it's a lovely piece of writing and the pics are beautiful and it'd be really worth letting it breathe as a performance, clearer, with some attention to the timing and pauses in the read. Worth getting another person to do the recording so you can really focus on the performance.
- In terms of thematically structuring the layout more meaningfully. Perhaps David Danaci's finds belong in your gallery labelled "promo"?
And the Watchmen narrative belongs with the When the Smiley Face turned Dark segment?
- The last quote from Nordin really lends itself to further exploration in this project. The pursuit of happiness and the positive psychology movement has become huge..and then there's the inner peace push in the West with the rise of yoga and meditation et al (which intersects with the positive psycholgy movement etc)...Is there more context that could be explored with this project in terms of why a happy face emoticon has so much traction in our society?
Great ideas, thanks again for adding to the Gene Pool. And good luck with your next projects.
Feel free to add your thoughts here too.
Natasha Mitchell
Presenter + science broadcaster - ABC Radio National
http://abc.net.au/rn/allinthemind
+
Gene Pool coproducer