I first encountered Her during a creative writing class centered around dystopian fiction. My initial reaction to the film was that of deep discomfort, but it was a discomfort I couldn’t attribute to a particular reason at the time. Years later, the answer came to me, after I watched the film again. Dystopic, it certainly is. But is it really fictional anymore? How much has ‘virtual reality’ become a tangible, omnipresent part of our physical existence?
Through these four comic panels I attempt to capture the disassociation from the physical world that occurs, when one begins to engage with the virtual world. I have used the main characters from the film to illustrate this.
Antara Raman is a recent graduate from Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology. Her interests span experimental visual communication, illustration, and textiles, predominantly around themes of nature, social issues, and surrealism. She currently works as a freelance illustrator and graphic designer for People’s Archive of Rural India (PARI). You can check out her work on Instagram.