The Nature of the Beast

2015. A series of digital collages and a drone survival manual.

Revisiting the visual mythology of King Kong (1933), this series of digital interventions destabilizes the boundaries between the primitive and the technologically evolved, the observer and the observed.

What once embodied the triumph of civilization over nature undergoes an unsettling reversal: the instruments of human supremacy acquire an autonomy of their own, while their creators retreat into the condition of the creature.

By appropriating the visual language of early cinema, the series introduces a temporal paradox. Images from 1933 become representations of a future that had yet to unfold in 2015, but which has since become increasingly familiar.

A decade later, as artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, and ubiquitous surveillance redefine our relationship with technology, the original premise acquires new significance. What began as a speculative and somewhat ironic intervention into cinematic history now interrogates the boundaries of human agency in a world increasingly mediated by machines.

The question is no longer who is the monster, but who retains the privilege of defining it.

Drone survival manual: DSG.pdf