How One Photographer Is Rethinking Pop Art on Instagram

For many, Instagram offers a new opportunity for photo sharing, but for fine art photographer Joseph Maida, it's the other way around: "Instagram was an opportunity for me to reconsider how we make, read and consume photographs," he tells TIME. "I look at it not as a side thing, but as an extension of my vision as an artist."
His project, Things are Queer, which he started in 2014 on his own Instagram account, was
inspired by pop art humor, Japanese kawaii and the millions of photographs of food shared on social media every day. "Pop art engages with the culture directly at the moment it's being made, says Maida. "It does so in a way that is seductive and evokes desire. But it also has an underlying criticality to it.
His straight, non-manipulated photographic style contrasts the weird, campy fantasy they depict- Maida calls it queer. "Photography is inherently a queer medium in that it's been on the outside," he says. "It has had to fight its way to be seen as equal to or, at times, even greater than other mediums like painting and sculpture.*