Product Flows by Chris Lael Larson

Issue 163

In the series Product Flows, I focus on the tension between the pleasure of purchasing goods and the guilt of engaging in the glut of consumer marketing and waste. I do this by using my own consumer waste as the physical and emotional source material for the work.

In the series, I alter and paint the packaging of goods that I have consumed — rebranding them — and then integrate them into assemblages that reference marketing process artifacts: audience research documents, sales analytics graphs, marked-up  marketing test prints, focus group recaps and trend analyses. I photograph these assemblages in the style of product photography and then digitally distort them by misusing an AI-powered image editing tool — subverting the tool's image-perfecting power to create a colorful cacophony that is equal parts enticing and overwhelming.

Chris Lael Larson lives and works in Portland, Oregon.
chrislaellarson.com | @chris_lael_larson