I spent most of Saturday smiling so hard my face hurt. That’s because I milled about the Internet Yami-Ichi for no less than three hours, which is a little like landing in the 150th wing of Internet and discovering there’s a very, very strange party going on. The day long event was actually a giant flea market hosting more than 140 vendors inside Masbeth’s Knockdown Center, a renovated factory space with brick walls, wooden support beams and 40 feet high ceilings. It was a fitting contrast to the vendors wares which were new, disposable and typically useless.
While there, I bought two used passwords for 25 cents a piece, a printout of an old meme I didn’t recognize on office paper for five bucks, two instagram prints printed at a resolution determined by the number of likes it received and plastic five dollar USB drive with animated GIFs on it. I also took home two free badges and a 32 page coffee stained zine filled with Internet slang.
Basically, it’s the best art fair ever. And that’s not just because I was able to buy something. At almost every booth someone was making something driven by their passion for online culture. These are the people who make up the nerdocracy that once ruled the web, and they haven’t gone away. If anything they’ve just gotten weirder. And that’s a very good thing. Highlights after the jump.
