Open a Window to the Abyss
by The Red Cartel

The Internet, at its most fantastic, is a magical dream floating all around us. At its most mundane, a bunch of cables under the ocean. Within the Internet are fully formed societies complete with their own subcultures and their own language, views, and ideals. It is also where pirates and anarchists reign supreme and where free speech is absolute and the right to uphold it is fought daily.

This book is an exercise in anonymity and an archive of what can be described as contemporary digital folk art radicalism. Simultaneously, it is a collection of infantile stoner humor based on layers of absurdity, cynicism, and recontextualization. Most importantly, it is a snapshot of a culture in the process of development.

Our news feeds are cluttered with the aesthetic efforts of an anonymous culture - the artistic output of this collective psyche - nameless rebel teens and bedroom anarchists. As an image or phase increases in popularity and notoriety, it will evolve into a mess of references and misinformation. The narrative structure of a memes evolution is as mysterious and complex as that of an exquisite corpse constructed in a mental hospital.

The following pages show only a minuscule amount of images, macros or memes if you like, acquired from all over the web and presented with random precision; no effort was made to protect the innocent and no one person can claim authorship. So let this book serve as a temporary window onto a continually evolving world of rapid-fire disposable ideas, one click wonders, and pictures of cats.

IMPACT is available online at oh-wow.com