On Purposefully Poor Images: Aesthetic Encounters with Alienation

Hito Steyerl’s theory of poor images describes images that travel through networks and lose resolution and information.1This article introduces the concept of purposefully-poor images, or images that are produced within the intention of looking degraded. These are low resolution, overly edited, unruly images who revel in their own mediocrity. Such images showcase the ability of certain meme producers to individually reproduce the look of circulation through specialised artistic practices. This intervention builds on contemporary theories of ugly digital aesthetics, but also situates purposefully-poor images in a longer tradition of aesthetics that emphasise amateur, DIY aesthetics. Such rebellious aesthetics utilises decay and ugliness as a strategy. However, I push further beyond this reading arguing that these images possess an alienated aesthetic. Purposefully-poor images draw attention to their own process of objectification by satirising their degradation. In showcasing the material markers of objectification, purposefully poor images narrativise the feeling of alienation.