An open-hearted interrogation of our digital selves, braiding cultural criticism, memoir, and narrative musings into an exploration of identity, girlhood, media, tech, nature and "finding the depth and beauty in the fucked-up world we live in" (Phoebe Bridgers) from writer, artist, and conflicted influencer Aiden Arata.
If you told Aiden Arata in 1995 that the internet would one day crown her the "meme queen of depression" and mega corporations would fly her to conferences to speak about commodifying one's emotions for views, she would have asked you what a meme was. Now, in her highly anticipated debut, she brings us raw reportage from that liminal space between online and offline worlds, illuminating how we got here and where to go next.
In this collection of kaleidoscopic essays, Aiden artfully explores what it means to exist on the internet, from fan fic forums to TikTok. She exposes influencer grifts from the perspective of a grifter, digs into the alluring aesthetic numbness of stay-at-home girlfriend content creators, and interrogates our online fetishization of doom to grapple with the real-world apocalypse. In her own words, "In some ways, the internet feels like a neutral energy in the way that money is a neutral energy, only as virtuous or wicked as the person using it. But then you have to follow that line of inquiry somewhere annoying like, Am I using it for good?"
YOU HAVE A NEW MEMORY is a deeply human inventory of the digital sphere, a searing analysis of the present and a prescient assessment of the future. Aiden is the wry, unexpected voice we need to navigate existing simultaneously as creators, consumers, and products in our increasingly braver and newer world. Aiden Arata is a writer and artist from Los Angeles, where she pens essays, fiction, and the occasional screenplay. Her writing has appeared in outlets including The Rumpus, BOMB, Hobart, The Fanzine, Wonderland and Alternative Press. In 2022, she wrote for the online sketch comedy show Stapleview. Her Substack, Under the Influence, explores the extremely online experience of an active participant in- and perpetuator of - internet culture. Her graphic and video art has garnered shoutouts and interviews in publications including The Cut, VICE, NBC, Mashable, Harper's Bazaar, The Washington Post, The Daily Dot, and Seventeen. She has shown at Human Resources (Los Angeles 2023) and Nous Tous (Los Angeles 2019), and her "Guided Meditation" video series will be a highlight of the Kunsthalle Museum of Bremen's 2023 bicentennial exhibition in Bremen, Germany. Her frequent creative collaborators include Meow Wolf and Phoebe Bridgers.
