How much well is well enough? Well, the wellwellwell.guru, Marisa Olson’s video infomercial, certainly tests our receptiveness (or tolerance) to the wellness phenomenon, the rise of the web gurus, and online mindfulness apps. Olson is one of the key artists of what has in recent years been coined post-Internet art. In her practice since the 1990s, she has been forming, rather than adopting, digital culture and its aesthetic imprint on contemporary art. In wellwellwell.guru, Olson appears as a star coach. With a suggestive voice and blinding smile, her performance makes it unclear whether she ridicules or conscribes to the cult of self development. A take on entrepreneurs capitalizing on self help, like Tony Robbins, Olson’s persona in the video is no less of a product. The character of her self development web guru is unabashedly penetrating the unconscious of the listener in a neuro-linguistic programming technique of guided visualization, offering the mirage of temporary escapism.

#wellness #WWWell #visualization #coaching #mindfulness #nlp #guru #infomercial

photos: Nysos Vasilopoulos, 6th Athens Biennale 2018 ANTI