Mass society in post-modern era

Mass society in post-modern era is to me a society characterized essentially by individuals whose behavior and thoughts are not autonomous as they should be, but are instead conditioned and conformed to external norms, behaviors and thoughts. Sometimes this is due to the individuals themselves, sometimes it is not, depending on their social conditions: if you don't have money you have to live in overcrowded working-class areas in the suburbs and your grave will be a little box in a wall, next to thousands of others.
The result is a long-term systematic decay in living conditions, in every day life, in arts, in culture. The only way to escape all this is try to think to oneself and to improve family and good social relations.
The following picture well depicts the kind of human being I personally don't wish to become.

Post-modern every man

Look at this sculpture. What do you see? A naked man, without face, with cables connected to his head turned away, big metal spines on his breast and shoulders, and a submachine gun for his left arm.

I don't know what the author's (Nicolas Vavassori) purpose was, unfortunately it didn't happen to me to talk with him, but I was really impressed by his unnamed work (exhibited at the Mini Maker Fair in Trieste this year), made of recycled and industrial materials.

The man depicted has no face, he's anonymous, as every human being in our post-modern era is, with the exception of movie stars, criminals and the mighty.

His head is turned away, he doesn't care. At the same it's connected by cables with something or somebody else, in other words he's unable to think for himself and he cannot take decisions nor act on his own, hanging from others.

Man is naked, he belongs to mankind, but nakedness also means that he doesn't have any sort of protection, with the exception of those big metal spines on his breast, shoulders and on the top of his back, that certainly defend him but, at the same time, prevent him from getting in touch with others.

At the end, he's one-armed, he's incomplete. The only way to overcome his handicap is through violence, represented by the submachine gun, which replaces his missing left hand.

Today the winner is this unnamed sculpture because it represents, in the very best possible way, the prototype of post-modern Everyman in mass, post-modern society.

That's all.

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