Interview: The Metamorphoses of Front as a Narrative Told through Social Media Interface: A Conversation with Donna Leishman

Front is an exciting departure for Donna Leishman. Best known for allegorical, often wordless, Flash-based narratives, in Front she tells a contemporary and text-based story. Front unfolds using a faux-Facebook page along with Twitter, SoundCloud, and other apps. Like many of her other works, Front continues a concern with female experience and agency as well as elements of fairy tale and myth but does so in a very different way. Through its pointed concern with our immersion and investment in social media, it speaks to the creation of virtual identities and personas as well as to concealed narratives of need, longing, or trauma. The work envisions narrative possibilities for these platforms.