Editor’s Note: As collaborators of an influential early ’00s collaborative blog hosted by Digital Media Tree, artists Sally McKay and Lorna Mills share a longstanding interest in collapsing and compressing the voyeuristic and perverted aesthetics and information of an unruly world wide web.

“Boost Presume I’m Gonna Breathe Grieved” (2021) is a GIF art commission for an ongoing Emily H. Tremaine Foundation-supported series. In this scrolling mix of McKay’s scanned, hand-drawn, and illustrated animations of trees and rivers alongside Mills’s knocked-out digital scribbles of smoke and forest fires, a much-needed acknowledgment of pandemic grief and isolation emerges. (Just make sure to hit that “Click Me! Please! Please!” button for the accompanying maudlin, 1970s AM radio soundtrack.)

This commissioned work, curated by the Tremaine’s Journalism Fellow for Curators Rea McNamara, is part of a series looking at how aspects of digital feminisms can inform better online curatorial practices.

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Amplify assume I’m gonna abide bitter. Boast consider I’m gonna act dismal. Boost determine I’m gonna breathe heartbroken. Brag expect I’m gonna continue melancholy. Caricature feel I’m gonna do mournful. Color guess I’m gonna endure pessimistic. Corrupt judge I’m gonna hold somber. Distort realize I’m gonna inhabit sorrowful. Embroider see I’m gonna last sorry. Emphasize take I’m gonna live wistful. Enlarge understand I’m gonna move bereaved. Exalt comprehend I’m gonna obtain blue. Expand conceive I’m gonna persist cheerless. Fabricate conclude I’m gonna prevail dejected. Falsify credit I’m gonna remain despairing. Fudge deem I’m gonna rest despondent. Heighten envisage I’m gonna stand disconsolate. Hike envision I’m gonna stay distressed. Inflate esteem I’m gonna subsist doleful. Blow out of proportion estimate I’m gonna survive down. Blow up out of proportion fancy I’m gonna be alive down in dumps. Build up feature I’m gonna go on down in mouth. Cook up foresee I’m gonna have being downcast. Go to extremes gather I’m gonna have place forlorn. I hold I’m gonna be gloomy. Amplify image I’m gonna abide glum. Boast imagine I’m gonna act grief-stricken. Boost presume I’m gonna breathe grieved. Brag project I’m gonna continue heartsick. Caricature reckon I’m gonna do heavyhearted. Color regard I’m gonna endure hurting. Corrupt sense I’m gonna hold in doldrums. Distort suppose I’m gonna inhabit in grief. Embroider surmise I’m gonna last in the dumps. Emphasize suspect I’m gonna live languishing. Enlarge vision I’m gonna move low. Exalt visualize I’m gonna obtain low-spirited. Expand be convinced I’m gonna persist lugubrious. Fabricate plan for I’m gonna prevail morbid. Falsify think I’m gonna remain morose. Fudge assume I’m gonna rest out of sorts. Heighten consider I’m gonna stand pensive. Hike determine I’m gonna stay sick at heart. Inflate expect I’m gonna subsist troubled. Blow out of proportion feel I’m gonna survive weeping. Blow up out of proportion guess I’m gonna be alive woebegone.

Sally McKay is an artist, curator, art writer, and educator based in Hamilton, Ontario. She has a PhD in Art History and Visual Culture from York University. Sally works in performance, installation, and...

Canadian artist Lorna Mills has exhibited her work in solo and group exhibitions since the 1990s. Her practice has included obsessive Ilfochrome printing, obsessive painting, obsessive super 8 film &...