Miss Bugs new resin popsicles highlight social media sickness

Mixed Media artist Miss Bugs is to unveil a new installation, entitled Do No Harm at Jealous
Gallery. The installation consists of 900 vibrant coloured resin ‘popsicles’, that in containing a
range of pharmaceuticals, critique contemporary society’s obsession and consumption of social
media.

Miss Bugs continues to draw on the theme of addiction to digital technology, and how over
exposure to news reels and digital feeds can act as an anaesthetic and numb the sense of reality.
Algorithms mean one becomes stuck in their own ‘echo chamber’, and can only gain access to
content that has been externally chosen to be suitable for them.

This dark notion is ‘sugar coated’ in the aesthetics of the popsicles. Each lolly is made up of
three layers of different coloured resin, in which a mix of surgical blades, Viagra, syringes and
various painkillers are contained. In the gallery the pop art style lollies will be presented on
mass in pharmaceutical orderliness. They will be sold in medical packaging, with instructions for
application, how to store and a warning of the side effects.

The installation’s title Do No Harm is pulled from the Hippocratic Oath, whereby doctors
promise to abstain from any intentional wrong doing to a patient. The irony of the statement is
evident in today’s networks and social dialogue where we continuously self-harm and cause
harm to others, in an endless loop.

Miss Bugs says:
“The ice lollies represent the churn of the social network; the posed selfies, the frothy coffee top
photos and the cute animal videos side of the internet that we all like to binge on, but inside it’s
rotten and sick. Digital technology whilst being a sweetener in our lives perpetually distracts us with a
constant, addictive stream of information and temptation. The internet becomes a space where
reason and logic are trumped by fake news, and people with extremes of opinion can shout each
other down. The candy on the outside sugar coats the sickness within.”

Miss Bugs individually hand craft each piece and their artistic process is time consuming with
unpredictable results. The process of mixing media and styles have led to Miss Bugs being
deemed ‘Visual DJs’, who like their influences such as Gary Hume, Hannah Höch and artists
from the pop art movement, remix, resource and reimagine pop culture.