Overtourism erased from vacation photos: the Instagram vs reality gap

A study by British insurer Admiral found that up to 98% of US Millennials plan trips based on social media images, which typically depict tourist destinations as peaceful, empty oases—contrasting sharply with the reality of overcrowding. This trend, dubbed 'Instagram tourism' or 'selfie tourism,' reflects a cultural phenomenon where users curate solitary, romanticized images, often editing out crowds. Sean P. Smith, a researcher at the Catholic University of Louvain, identifies the 'promontory witness' figure as a nod to Romantic and colonial aesthetics that now fuels personal branding and a desire for symbolic isolation. The contradiction is highlighted by the 'Instagram vs reality' trend, where users expose actual crowded conditions. Belgian artist Natacha de Mahieu's series 'Theatre of Authenticity' takes this further by photographing high-traffic sites over an hour and compositing the images into a single chaotic mosaic, revealing the hidden crowds. The article notes UNESCO's 2024 alert on selfie tourism and the psychological drivers behind the preference for empty frames, linking it to a need for control and an idealized world.