At this point, anyone who has a smartphone knows what a meme is. Memes are a means for instant comic relief. This comic relief can be random or it can relate to current events. Gone are the days where, if you wanted a good laugh you had to watch an entire comedy sketch or fish through Youtube for some funny videos. Nowadays, all you need is a smartphone or laptop, and a social media account. Twitter, preferably.  There’s a saying that all funny memes are born on twitter and if you saw a meme on Facebook, Instagram or other social media platforms, twitter definitely saw it first. Over the years memes have really evolved. Below are a few sample of memes I harvested from twitter.

There’s a meme about possibly every subject now. For example, lets look at the whole of the year 2020. 2020 was a wild year for a variety of reasons. One of the most notable momentf of 2020 was the start of the pandemic. The following months ater the offical shutdown in march, everyone grew restless at home and thus, stormed to the internet to let off steam. During this time, memes were in abundance.  The year 2020 was the perfect recipe for meme creation, as a string of unusual events unfolded, such as the killer hornets, impeachment of donald trump and a possible World War 3, to name a few. The fact that memes can be created from these events shows the versatility of memes. They can be seen as little snapshots of events in this sense.

Now, to answer the question “Is meme Art?” We have to define art first. According to wikipedia, the official definition of ART can be summarized as human expression, which reflects the creator’s imagination, conceptual ideas, etc. Memes are relatively new so it’s understandable why some people dont consider it art. Memes are also severely underrated as they dont get the attention they deserve. Even though theyre a bit unconnventional in what we consider as art, as memes catch on to more people I believe they will be readily accepted as a form of contemporary art with potential to jokingly capture facets of society. Until next time…..

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