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Brendan North is a fine art photographer based in Los Angeles, California. Having built a social media presence of over 1 million people between platforms, he is one of the most followed photographers in the world.

Brendan has created a signature style that captures the glamorous side of society while offering commentary on issues he finds important at the same time. He believes that the future of photography lies with the artists who truly have something to say. From images of a post-apocalyptic future ruled by artificially intelligent beings to visions of a world dripping in gold, his photos have a voice of their own. Personally mentored by one of the great artist photographers of our time, Tyler Shields, Brendan is making a name for himself in the art world and his prints have been purchased by collectors across the globe.

For his genesis NFT drop, Brendan gives us his contemplative “Digital Daydream” project. He describes the series as a predictive story of the possible futures of humanity and our relationship with technology. The series starts with three surreal animated images of four women set at the pool of a stylish mansion. These aren’t your typical models though. They have been made to look nearly identical, a commentary Brendan notes, on our desire to assimilate and fit in as a result of our overexposure to social media. These women are seemingly immersed in a different world by the virtual reality headsets that adorn each of their faces. “Humanity’s appetite for technology and luxury is insatiable,” Brendan says. “As we dive deeper into the ever-expanding virtual world, you can’t help but wonder; have we lost touch with reality, or have we discovered a better one? Is this world enough for us or do we need to be the gods of a new one that we control? I set this scene at a location that for many today would be more than enough, yet our subjects are lost in VR demonstrating our never-ending hunger for more.”

He continues, “It seems to me that when it comes to the virtual world, we have three choices; accept it as our new reality and leave this one behind, dismiss it and embrace the world we have, or coexist with it, allowing it to better our world instead of replacing it. The next step in our evolution will be one where technology enhances us beyond biological means. Humans of the future will be a perfect mesh of man and machine.” And it was the idea of this fusion of people and AI that brought forth the follow-up images in the “Digital Daydream” series. The evolution of our assimilated models takes the next step as they are replaced with elegant beings from the future.

Brendan recalls the moment the idea to shoot mannequins as futuristic models came to him, “It was May of 2020 and we had been on lockdown in Los Angeles for nearly three months. I was tired of taking self-portraits and I wanted to create something poignant to the situation facing our species. A virus had disrupted our fragile human programming and brought the world to its knees.” “So I began to wonder, will we one day leave the weakness of our biological bodies behind? And what would that look like as a photograph?” Brendan began searching far and wide across the internet for his shiny new virus-proof models and found the two he affectionately refers to as “the sisters.” “They were perfect subjects,” he explains. “I could create images evoking questions I found compelling all while not worrying about shooting in close proximity with living models during a pandemic. They also hold their poses much better than any models I’ve worked with before.”

It is interesting to note that this series was also shot entirely using medium format film cameras from the 1970s. “There is something beautiful to me about using analog technology to capture images that are attempting to predict the future,” he adds. He also teases that “the sisters” have gained new family members recently as an expansion of this concept is in the works.

The “Digital Daydream” project contains five pieces and will be released in parts. The first moving image will be released on April 8th on Brendan’s SuperRare profile.

SuperRare: @brendannorth
Instagram: @brendannorth 
Twitter: @ImBrendanNorth