Tutte le volte che sono morta

By Francesca Mattiacci

Topic: Personal Data

Medium: Object

Material: Fake pills

Institute: Politecnico di Milano

Year: a.a. 2023-2024

How easy is it, in the digital sphere, for a hypochondriac or anxious person to fall into a vicious circle of deadly and harmful selfdiagnoses based on common symptoms (cyberchondria)? A series of medicine bottles has been devised, each named after the symptom entered in the Google search bar. Attached to each vial is a leaflet that collects all the searches I have made and their “fatal” diagnoses over the past twelve months, judged from the search results. The drug ironically tries to draw attention to the issue of digital selfdiagnosis and “all the times I’ve died”.

Featured image of the project Tutte le volte che sono morta

Complementary image of the project Tutte le volte che sono morta

Metaphor used:

Through the metaphor of death, which is often counted among the consequences of illnesses or symptoms sought on the Internet, the nonsense of the psychological mechanism behind cyberchondria is finally revealed. Doctor Google is no longer just a digital oracle, but also the pharmaceutical company that provides cures for any symptom, which always seem to lead to death.

Intended Meaning:

The intention is to ironically defuse my hypochondria or that of anxious people like me by making it clear how absurd it is that in the digital world from a trivial symptom one always arrives at a catastrophic sentence.

Source:

Google history of the last twelve months on searching for symptoms and illnesses.