The persona: Nicola Naumann, mid-50s
Nicola works as a nurse in a hospital and has school-age children. Global developments leave her with a growing sense of insecurity. On social media she mainly consumes private content with no direct link to the news — job-related updates, plus feel-good content such as animal videos and cooking tutorials.
Nicola’s persona is modelled on the traditional milieu: an older generation that values safety and order, with a self-image of being down-to-earth, upright people.
The feed
A real Instagram account was created for the persona and the algorithm was trained: swiping through reels for 15 minutes, watching and liking fitting videos twice, skipping unfitting ones quickly. The For You page was then screen-recorded. For the installation, the material was translated frame by frame into a silkscreen halftone; the displayed texts are inspired by the originals but rewritten to respect copyright and personality rights.
Video work, 5:03 min, silent — silkscreen halftone, word-by-word text
Printed fabric panels on an aluminium spiral · Part of “inside / outside bubbles”, Dortmunder U, 2026