the internet used to be good and now the internet is bad. social media, disinformation, harassment, bigotry, the toxic wells of hatred and misery, the soul-sucking corporate monopolies: all of these things have something in common.
they are all right side up. none of them are upside-down.
to revolve, to rotate. to revolt, to succeed in a revolution, is to turn society on its head. this is self-explanatory, then, yes? to turn something upside-down is revolutionary.
the act of turning something upside down is not only revolutionary. it is critical; as in, useful in the practice of critique. common practice in drawing classes is to turn one's drawing upside-down in order to look at it not just as the picture you are accustomed to seeing but as a collection of shapes and lines. when something is turned upside-down its flaws become more clear. the magician's illusion is broken, art reduced once more to its component elements. from this perspective you can see things you couldn't otherwise. from this perspective you can more clearly enumerate what it is that needs to be fixed.
when the html and css of an upside-down website is resolved into a page, it is difficult to parse, difficult for the mind and the eye to follow. it immediately confronts the viewer in the most direct way possible: this is not for you. this creation is not meant to be glanced at and then discarded. this is something which requires commitment, and if you do not commit you are barred entry.
the viewer must ask the question: why? why is this upside-down? they are forced out of the mode of consumption and into engagement instead, knocked forcibly out of their comfort zone and into a space wherein they can no longer ignore their frustration and annoyance.
will the viewer push past the friction and annoyance? will they turn it into determination and motivation, a small problem to be solved? or will they reject the experience and look away?
either way the viewer of the art is not able to be unchallenged by it; there is no "easy" way to engage with it. the viewer is instead forced to accept or reject the challenge, rather than allowed to passively consume the art.
legibility is synonymous with normativity; normativity is synonymous with conformity; conformity is by its nature un-queer. therefore in order to truly embody a "queer" existence online, one must become illegible.
what is queerness if not the embrace of different orientations? what is upside-down if not a different orientation? the upside-down website is queer art; not art made by someone who is queer, not art that addresses queerness, but art that is, itself, queer.
through the complication of ending and beginning we reference the nature of the internet as something outside of time, something which is not touched by it in the way that organic beings are. a website does not decay, does not weather. a website is not smoothed by the elements or shaped by those who experience it. a website is what it is until it isn't; until it breaks, ceases to function, or is explicitly changed.
all endings are beginnings. when something ends, something else begins; all of existence is essentially the endless process of transformation. nothing is truly destroyed, only changed from one form to another.
it reminds the artist that pleasure lies in the making of a thing, not only in the result. the text, order, layout, elements: all of them are perfectly legible to the artist, who is freely able to change the orientation of the piece as they please.
this work can be created in as much right-side-up detail and care as possible and then, to finish it off, turned around. the artist loses nothing at all. you remain able to both share and hide your work; keeping it simultaneously public and private through the obscurity of its orientation.
in order to enjoy it as you enjoy it, the viewer must work as you have worked. they must participate in the creation process. they must re-create it for themselves.