Nothing to hide, Nothing to fear reflects on the concept of privacy – in the face of increasing surveillance both online and in person, this work asks why is privacy important to us.
To date, this series includes a drypoint prints of self-portraits playing with disguise and a zine There’s something sacred about your personal life. They were exhibited together at Black Swan Arts for Uncommon Ground (Sept-Oct 2025).
The drypoint prints are intended to be a light-touch, humorous look at disguising oneself in the face of encroaching surveillance cameras. The use of CCTV does support feelings of safety, but this combined with the ubiquity of cameras in everyone’s hands, has created a new world where our selves may be captured at any time.
The zine draws on Professor Daniel Solove’s work on privacy – this blog post is an easy-to-read and thought-provoking article which makes the issues more tangible. It lists 10 reasons why privacy is important, including: privacy as a limit on government power, privacy as respect and trust for individuals, privacy protects our dignity – be able to be ourselves (which can’t happen when we are watched), privacy allows creativity to flourish – we can make our mistakes and not stifle bold ideas, and privacy is key to political and social change – for example, there is a chilling effect on protest in the increase of surveillance.
These zines are freely available for you. If you’re feeling flush, make a donation to Liberty
Instructions to make zine yourself:
- print out A3 or A4
- it can be black/white or in colour
- follow this link for cutting/folding video (or search for other ‘how to fold a mini-zine’ videos if this one is too speedy