How to perform as the best version of yourself?

Nowadays, the construction of a personal narrative is considered an essential element for gaining visibility and achieving success. In this context, the artist’s image, together with their work, is shaped as a brand to be strategically managed and efectively communicated to the public. It therefore becomes necessary to nurture, build, and ultimately perform an alternative, often + idealized, version of oneself. This process can be interpreted as a pursuit of an ideal self: a version of oneself perceived as desirable
and acceptable, both in the eyes of others and one’s own. Within this dynamic, public figures such as idols, influencers, and celebrities, endowed with a recognizable image defined by their values and aesthetic codes, become models to emulate.
The construction and public adoration of these figures, perceived as perfect, exceptional, and oftenunattainable models, constitute the cultural phenomenon known as celebrity culture. The project aims to explore this phenomenon by analysing its characteristics, historical evolution, and potential impact on identity. Furthermore, it delves into artistic practices that have critically engaged with the media representations of idols and the values they convey, highlighting both the potential, contradictions, and
limitations of such models. Among the reference artists are David Bowie, Cindy Sherman, and Amalia Ulman.
Finally, the project Il Debutto explores the process of constructing an idealized version of the self. By manipulating one’s personal narrative, a journey of observation and transformation was undertaken with the goal of building and representing a new identity. The self is conceived as a project to be realized, an ideal to be reached, pushing to the extreme the reflection on personal image, sometimes bordering on an obsession with oneself.