Overthink

Justin Bishop

“The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use them.” 
— Philip K. Dick 

Overthink considers how words accumulate meaning through repetition, context and circulation, and how contemporary media environments shape the ways we think, feel and respond. 

The work takes its title from ‘overthinking’: the heightened sense of anxiety that can emerge through repeated analysis and exposure to competing information. Social media has intensified this experience. Its continuous streams of headlines, commentary and content, driven by systems designed to capture and retain attention, can amplify emotionally charged material and reinforce existing beliefs and biases. 

Within this environment, language is rarely neutral. Words can be repeated, reframed and removed from context, becoming tools for persuasion, engagement, profit and, at times, propaganda. Bishop is interested in the psychological effects of this constant circulation and the increasingly blurred boundary between information, influence and manipulation. 

Drawing on fonts, lone words and the visual conventions of headline messaging, Bishop uses illuminated advertising signage to explore how the same word can carry markedly different meanings depending on where and how it is used. 

Suspended as commercial signage, the text is deliberately decontextualised: stripped of punctuation and reference, and pulled apart into consonants and vowels. Bishop slows down the usually instantaneous act of reading, creating space between message and response and encouraging reflection over reaction. 

Content extends this enquiry, pointing to the uneasy relationship between language, influence and commodity. 

Justin Bishop?(b. Mulubinba / Newcastle, 1975) is an artist whose work draws upon place, experience and memory. 

He is a graduate of University of Southern Queensland (Toowoomba, c.2000) and has since worked in the cultural sector in Queensland as an artist and arts worker.  

During the pandemic Bishop transitioned into the signage industry, where its materials and approaches to image-making opened new pathways in his practice, particularly through text-based work. He views these explorations as complimentary to his painting practice. 

Bishop considers himself a returning artist, re-engaging with exhibitions and developing work grounded in personal meaning. He currently lives, works and maintains a multidisciplinary practice on Gurambilbarra / Townsville.