[spectre] Restructuring the Interfac e – ‘Family Portrait’

[lkl at mit.edu]

Call for Help:

Restructuring the Interface – ‘Family Portrait’ 
is a project that asks individuals to upload one html and one jpeg file to 
their own website - webserver. The project seeks to question the embedded 
societal biases that are found in the 'family portrait' as represented in the 
Google image search. 

Files can be download here: 
mac files: http://www.family-portrait.org/family_portrait_images.sit 
pc files: http://www.family-portrait.org/family_portrait_images.exe 

After uploading the files simply email the location of the files to family-
admin at family-portrait.org. The link will be added at the www.family-
portrait.org site in order to create and map a network of members. 

Read below for a detailed description of the project or go to http://
www.family-portrait.org. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 
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Restructuring the Interface – Family Portrait is a project that explores the 
embedded societal biases that are further perpetuated by the Internet and 
Google. The ‘family portrait’ is an image that conveys an unblemished perfected 
representation of the family. Access to the Internet is limited resulting in 
Googles representations of family portrait to be socially and racially limited. 
Google as an index to the Internet also becomes its interface, an interface 
because it is the point of interaction – mediation between a user and 
information. Restructuring the Interface seeks to actively question the bias by 
making Google into a space to contest and define meaning by actively changing 
the images that are indexed by Google. The redefinition of the family portrait 
results by removing individuals from the portraits leaving behind their blank 
silhouettes. The silhouettes serve as empty spaces that contest the limited 
racial and social representations as perpetuated by the technologies of the 
Internet and Google. 

Please join the project in order to make it possible. 

best.wishes 
family-admin at family-portrait.org 
http://www.family-portrait.org/