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THE NARRATIVE ARC
The Instagram Art Scam That Became My Greatest Performance
When the Hunter Becomes the Hunted
The photo was magnificent, perhaps the best I’d ever captured. Standing atop Summit One Vanderbilt, Manhattan’s newest sky-high playground for social media addicts, I had managed to catch my teenage son Charlie in what he believed was the perfect pose. The lighting was ethereal, the backdrop breathtaking, and Charlie looked like he belonged on the cover of a magazine.
I’m no Annie Leibovitz, mind you. My photography skills hover somewhere between ‘enthusiastic amateur’ and ‘dad with an iPhone’ — definitely more the latter. But something about that moment, the golden hour light filtering through the observation deck’s geometric glass panels, Charlie’s natural confidence as he struck his pose, combined to create magic.
Like everyone else in that glass tower, I posted the photo immediately. Within minutes, the likes began rolling in.
But I had no idea that one particular viewer would soon turn my simple family photo into the opening act of an elaborate performance.
Roughly an hour after posting, my phone buzzed with a Direct Message from someone named Angela. Her profile showed an attractive woman surrounded by canvases and…
