Hito Steyerl writes in In Defense of the Poor Image about how online images circulate in ways that increasingly fracture and disperse their original meaning. As they are shared between internet users, they become “squeezed through slow digital connections, compressed, reproduced, ripped, remixed, as well as copied and pasted into other channels of distribution.” This process of dissemination of poor images, particularly within the medium of memes, results in an image that is in constant flux between what it was and what it has become. Memes especially create myriad iterations that not only alter the meaning of the original image but that can completely reinvent the image itself.

It is clear, then, that a meme’s value lies within its ability to evolve rather than its “originary original.” However, as a consumer of memes rather than a creator, what is unclear to me is the process behind this; how exactly do memes evolve and disperse, and what is it about the medium that makes it so easy for these mutations to happen? How does a multitude of meanings and stories spawn from one single image? By the time a meme has reached the palm of my hand it has already seen thousands of different timelines, splintering off into disparate meanings and uses. It is both this journey and the destination that I am interested in uncovering through my work.

To research this, the medium of publication is used to unearth the narratives behind the distribution of the meme Woman Yelling at a Cat (pictured). Taking influence from the way Arjan de Nooy compresses down an image to tell different stories in 99:1 (which is derived from Raymond Queneau’s book Exercises in Style), I have created 99 versions of this meme which demonstrate how it can become gradually more and more abstracted, compressed and deformed, deriving them from the genealogy of the meme and wider internet culture. By referencing de Nooy’s work, I am producing a copy of a copy, which in itself refers to the ways images are propagated online.

The publication also takes the form of a 13m long scroll, physically translocating the digital experience of the infinite scroll onto paper and subverting the informality of the medium. In terms of meme selection, I have chosen this particular meme because it shows conflict - a theme that is key both to the original story in Exercises in Style and to many memes that have circulated since the early days of the internet to now. The use of a scroll further highlights this theme as this form of publication has been used since the ancient Greeks to distribute important information and long-form news. The clash between a woman and a cat is therefore presented as a report on a war, albeit a petty one. The ability of memes to speak about an increasingly divided society in a trivial and light-hearted way is at the core of what makes this meme so successful. It is this complexity in its conception, as well as its many replications, that makes it a notable starting point to dissect its medium