Contemporary Bias

2018. The assignment: to design a chess set that reflects ideas of social change by disrupting the ancient ideas about power and hierarchy embedded in traditional chess pieces.

KING: The fountain pen symbolizes the dominance of media in shaping how we see the world and how that affects our government.

QUEEN: The Queen’s fire is the fire of the Statue of Liberty, representing freedom of speech as a sacred democratic value that some in the media also use to shield their abuses.

BISHOP: The “Resist” fist represents how emotion clouds our ability to see our own biases. This suits the role of a chess bishop – a highly powerful piece that’s also limited, unable to reach half the squares.

KNIGHT: The hood of anonymity speaks to how people who mask or disguise their identities, like trolls, can shift the entire way our democracy functions.

ROOK: The satellite dish represents the technology of modern media, which enables rapid political changes and represents an unloveable fortress that locks us into our own political echo chambers .PAWN:An anthropomorphized version of the classic pawn, to represent how everyday people are influenced and manipulated by forces other than elected government.

Materials: Mahogany, maple, plastic bike light

Collaborators: Jakob Sperry