Entering the Italian digital designer Alessandra Vuillermin’s Instagram is like entering the gates of a Hentai heaven; dreamlike and otherworldly. Alessandra’s milieu is filled with digital glossy creatures that juxtapose the link between the human body and the inner-self. Injecting inputs from her own realm combined with imagination and technology, Alessandra’s work is futuristic and dreamlike, showcasing unconventional beauty standards. We have asked this insta artist about her interpretation of a post-digital future, how she hones her creative vision, what inspires her the most and where ‘beauty’ lies in her grotesque world.

Hi Alessandra! Can you tell us a bit about yourself, where you come from and what you stand for?
Hello there, I'm an Italian digital designer currently based in the Czech Republic. I'm about to turn 24 and for the past few years, I have been floating around Europe, living in Milan, London and now Prague. My identity as a designer is focusing on creating fictional scenarios that represent my aesthetic through my emotional bond with technology.

Your Instagram bio reads: “feelings interlocking computer imagery”, does that best describe your vision?
Since I was young I have always used technology as a tool to escape reality. The digital world allowed me to re-design myself in a way that I could express my true identity, chasing my dreams and creating something that was able to become reality in a fraction of a second.
My starting point was the world of video games, as for most of the people, which gave me the chance to create my own "bubble" to live in, and now gives me the opportunity to work with it.

Growing up, was Hentai a genre that you always followed?
As I previously mentioned, my starting point was the world of video games, which opened me to the world of Hentai as well. My first jump into the Hentai world was certainly thanks to one of my favourite video games, "Tekken 3", produced by Namco back to 1997 which was characterised by hyper-sexualised female character as Ling Xiaoyu and many others, whose were rapidly re-designed by Hentai artists on the web.

Tell us a bit about your creative process.
My creative process I believe it's mainly based on re-elaborating inputs I get from society and surroundings using technology as a tool, to recreate and mimic them through my emotionality.
Sometimes I wonder if reality actually exists as we perceive it, if things do have a real and objective manner that never changes with time, or if we just perceive everything that happens to us through our imagination without objective detachment. If it’s true, that dreaming something makes it real, then this is certainly what it's guiding me through my creative process.

Is the ‘age of grotesque’ your interpretation of a post-digital future?
I have always been a big fan of Marilyn Manson as his music formed me since my youngest age, and "the golden age of grotesque" is the title of one of his main songs, which is a statement piece for me. In it’s lyrics, one specific sentence says "You say what you want, but filth is all that they hear", which for me perfectly describes the obstacles I have always found within expressing myself free from boundaries.

Are you trying to redefine the standards of beauty? Is this a new aesthetic?
I have always believed in the idea of subjective beauty.
Since my young age, I have been characterised by following unconventional beauty standards, which certainly describe myself as a whole, but also my production as a digital designer.

What is it about bodies that fascinates you?
I love the human body, as it's capable to express not only the physical state on the surface but also the inner self through emotions that led on the skin and features.
That's why I usually work with the corruption of human figures, in a way that let me reduce the limit between the human body shell and the inner self.

Which artists inspire you the most?
Regarding the digital world, Thomas Webb, online's famous as @webb, is certainly my biggest inspiration, as he works as a media artist that explores the cyber field and game engines related softwares, using human-centred emotions as a tool to get deeper into the society's bond with the digital dimension.

What’s your message to Instagram for constantly censoring this kind of art?
When Instagram algorithm deletes my posts or shadow-ban my profile, I genuinely take it as a compliment. The IG's mechanisms of censorship is based on the ability to detect female nipples and nudity in general, which leads me to believe that my characters must look human-ish to the algorithm itself. Regarding the shadow-ban side to it, it certainly upsets me in a way that through this process, Instagram is limiting the number of people that can get in touch with my projects online, and as a freelancer, I work also thanks to my visibility on social media.
So my message to Instagram, regarding the topic, would be to be more creator-friendly, especially cause I have been a part of the IG's creator beta group, since when the AR filter thing was way unpopular than today.

Does COVID-19 exist in your virtual world?
I do believe that ignorance it's a very problematic "virus" if we wanna call it this way, according to the fact that it brings people to have an opinion or judge something merely based on an aesthetic approach rather than digging deeper to understand the true meaning behind something. However, I think that uniqueness and quirkinesses are becoming more and more socially acceptable, in a way that being "different" or "grotesque" is becoming part of normality, thanks to the more inclusive future we are hopefully going towards.

In the age of collaborations, what is your dream collaboration? Is it Michèle Lamy- I see that you follow her on Instagram.
I appreciate that you mentioned Michèle Lamy, as she was always a 360° inspiration to me, which most of the people aren't aware of, as it doesn't show much on my digital production. Funny enough I was born on her same day, 20th of April, obviously decades later and in 2018, while I was living in London, working for a South-Korean fashion brand, I had the great chance to meet her in real life. Going back to your question, yeah, it’s definitely a life-dream of mine to collaborate with such a unique artist.