Vacc-Sining Against the Infodemic: The Role of Filipino Digital Artists in Fighting Social Media Misinformation and Disinformation in the Philippines

Amidst the rapid exchange of information in social media lies emerging digital diseases – a phenomenon known as the infodemic. Recent and local research suggests treating such a dilemma as political, requiring a community-driven approach rather than exclusively employing technical solutions. Thus, this research seeks to explore the role of Filipino digital artists in the fight against the social media infodemic. It aims to study their different visual communication approaches and techniques, and how they use such in communicating concepts related to the infodemic in the Philippines. To generate answers, the research will follow specific criteria in selecting ten digital artworks. Compositional interpretation and semiotic analysis will be employed in the analysis. They will then utilize the theory of Instrumentalism, which suggests that art is a valuable tool that could be used in social functions. The research draws out three theoretical significance of digital art from this theory: it is persuasive, informative, and representative of social issues. The researcher will adopt the techniques and visual communication approaches from the data collected and apply them in making the artwork, a zine by the same title, Vacc-Sining. This digital art zine features nine artworks that visualize the issue and depict how artists visualize truth during times plagued with falsehood, claiming the involvement of artists in digital spaces is a better response than silence