Room One
Conservative Media Ecosystem
The Project
Different screens. Different worlds.
Americans watching the same story - immigration, climate, identity, elections - are absorbing fundamentally different versions of it, depending on which screens surround them. That divide is usually invisible.
Media Diet makes it visible and viscerally felt. We documented real people's media rooms from across the political spectrum, physically rebuilt them inside a gallery, and programmed them with the content those people actually consume. The same topics play out across all three rooms - through entirely different lenses.
"We don't disagree on the facts. We live in different information universes."
The Installation
Three Rooms. Three Realities.
Each room is a documentary in miniature - real furniture, real objects, and real media, drawn from a participant's documented viewing habits. Visitors can select topics and watch the same story told three different ways, simultaneously.
Room Two
Progressive Media Ecosystem
Room Three
Independent Media Ecosystem
Why It Matters
The numbers behind the divide.
28%
Trust in media is an all-time low. Among Republicans, it has dropped to single digits for the first time.
3 in 4
Americans overestimate their ability to distinguish real news from false. Confidence does not protect you. It may do the opposite.
54%
Social media is now Americans' #1 news source - surpassing TV and news websites for the first time.
208
U.S. counties now have zero local news sources. Around 55 million Americans have limited or no access to local journalism.
7 hrs
Average American screen time per day. Average attention span on a screen: 43 seconds - down 9% in two years.
96 pts
Partisan gap in trust of CNN. A 62-point gap on Fox News. The same channel reads as reliable or propaganda, depending on who's watching.
Visit
Now open in Provincetown.
- Dates
- March 13 - August 2, 2026
- Venue
- Stanley494 Commercial StreetProvincetown, MA
- Hours
- Open during Twenty Summers gallery hours
- Admission
- Free and open to the public
- Presented by
- Twenty Summers
The installation ends in a conversation space where visitors reflect on what they experienced together. Group visits, school visits, and facilitated discussions are welcome.
Created by
The Artists
Amar C. Bakshi
Co-Creator
Artist whose work explores connection across distance, difference, and media. Creator of Portals, a global network of life-size video environments linking communities in 30+ countries. Bakshi's practice puts strangers face-to-face across borders and asks what happens when the medium is the divide.
Heidi Boisvert
Co-Creator
Interdisciplinary artist and creative technologist whose work investigates how media and storytelling shape the body, behavior, and belief. Boisvert built the technical architecture of the installation - the systems that allow visitors to move fluidly between media realities across all screens simultaneously.
The Team
Who Made This.
Amar C. Bakshi
Co-Creator
Heidi Boisvert
Co-Creator
Kari Mulholland
Project Director
Cecilia Parker
Producer, Twenty Summers
Michael Berens
Scenic Designer
Josiah Noble
Set Builder
Reuben Bechtold
Set Builder
Kat Wright
Set Dresser
Jingyao Shao
Creative Technologist
Maci Morris
Participant & Content Researcher
Patrick Rufino
Video Editor
Thor Matthiasson
Web AI Tool Developer
Lucas Drummond
Graphic Design & Web
Rhea McTiernan Huge
Social Media
Sonia Banchez
Social Media Strategy
Gail Heimann
Board, Twenty Summers
Mike Carroll
Gallery Owner & Board, Twenty Summers
Touring
Bring Media Diet to your institution.
The installation is designed to travel. We are actively seeking partnerships with museums, universities, libraries, and civic organizations for future runs.
If you are interested in hosting Media Diet - or in using it for education, journalism, or community dialogue - reach out.
Suitable for
- Museums presenting work on media, democracy, or contemporary life
- Universities exploring polarization, communication, and public opinion
- Libraries and civic institutions hosting community conversations
- Foundations focused on democracy, trust, and social cohesion
- Journalists and educators teaching media literacy