Data Design
Lorenzo Bacchin
Matrix 1
Matrix 2
Selected Works
1. "I love Alaska", by Submarine Channel (Youtube).
Queries entered in AOL's search engine were made public and these short movies rearrange those sentences into intimate and unsettling narratives.
2. "Leaves of Grass", by Geoffrey Farmer.
Thousands of clips were taken from American magazine LIFE between year 1935 and 1985 and organised into a horizontal collage, where all images are sorted as a timeline.
3. "Person in Red", by Kamiya Jokar.
Security camera videos portraying different people dressed in red are screened to be perceived as a single story with a single character.
4. "Tattoo Biosensors".
Tattoos that change color when reacting with glucose levels: minimally invasive, injectable dermal biosensors were developed for measuring pH, glucose, and albumin concentrations.
5. "Google Earth Timelapse".
Google Earth team added a feature to the software that allows to see 37 years of satellite photos in a timeline. This helps to visualise the effect of urbanisation and climate change in many areas of the planet.
6. "Popsicles of Pollution", by students from National Taiwan University of the Arts.
Three students of the National Taiwan University of the Arts have created 100 popsicles made from polluted waters of Taiwan’s lakes, rivers, beaches and ports to raise awareness on the problem of pollution.
7. "Arcadia", by Hiroshi Sugimoto.
Long exposure photographies collect all the frames during the screening a movie within a single image. The result is a white movie screen.
8. "Yellow Dust", by Nerea Calvillo with Raúl Nieves, Pep Tornabell, Yee Thong Chai, Emma Garnett, Marina Fernandez.
A round canopy emits an amount of water vapour depending on the density of toxic particles detected in the air. More than tangibly visualising datas, the tool also helps humidifying and cooling the air.
9. "Wage Islands", by Ekene Ijeoma.
Wage Islands is an interactive installation which submerges a topographic map of NYC underwater. It visualises where low-wage workers can afford to rent by gradually bringing to the surface portions of the 3D map, according to the inserted numbers.
10. "The Midnight Gospel", by Pendleton Ward and Duncan Trussell.
The animated series dialogues are collected from recorded interviews of Duncan Trussell's podcast.
11. "Sunspiring", by Oscar Sharp and Ross Goodwin.
This is a 2016 experimental sci-fi short film entirely written by an artificial intelligence bot using neural networks. The AI gathered datas from sci-fi movies and the film was shot accordingly to its script.
12. "Camera Restricta" by Philipp Schmitt.
Camera Restricta is a speculative design of a new kind of camera. It locates itself via GPS and searches online for photos that have been geotagged nearby.
If the camera decides that too many photos have been taken at your location, it retracts the shutter and blocks the viewfinder.
13. "Ground Resistance", by Wesley Goatley and Georgina Voss.
Ground Resistance explores the possibilities, as well as some of the potential perils, of smart cities being “all-seeing and always-on.” The exhibit projects a map of the town of Milton Keynes, pinpointing live infrastructure data such as electricity, gas meters, traffic activity, car parks, bus routes, and more. A bell is tolled whenever a dataset is updated.
14. "WWF Endangered Species Pixelated Art", by WWF and Mikami Yoshiyuki.
To visualise the decline of endangered species, pictures of animals are displayed with a resolution that is equal to the number of that species population.
Personal favourites:
6. "Popsicles of Pollution", by students from National
Taiwan University of the Arts
10. "The Midnight Gospel", by Pendleton Ward and
Duncan Trussell
7. "Arcadia", by Hiroshi Sugimoto
3. "Person in Red", by Kamiya Jokar
1. "I love Alaska", by Submarine Channel (Youtube)
Findings:
I was not surprised to see many of my interests going in the direction of soft data and storytelling, being animation my major. Anyway I found in the database structure very helpful examples for nailing down a bit more what kind of way of expressing I'm interested in.
A combination of soft data and database structure can lead to results that have a fascinating degree of abstraction and non-linearity, while being aesthetically impactful, thought-provoking and readable. That's why "Popsicles of Pollutions" is my personal favourite here.
Legend:
1. "I love Alaska", by Submarine Channel (Youtube)
2. "Leaves of Grass", by Geoffrey Farmer
3. "Person in Red", by Kamiya Jokar
4. "Tattoo Biosensors"
5. "Google Earth Timelapse"
6. "Popsicles of Pollution", by students from National
Taiwan University of the Arts
7. "Arcadia", by Hiroshi Sugimoto
8. "Yellow Dust", by Nerea Calvillo with Raúl Nieves,
Pep Tornabell, Yee Thong Chai, Emma Garnett,
Marina Fernandez.
9. "Wage Islands", by Ekene Ijeoma
10. "The Midnight Gospel", by Pendleton Ward and
Duncan Trussell
11. "Sunspiring", by Oscar Sharp and Ross Goodwin
12. "Camera Restricta" by Philipp Schmitt
13. "Ground Resistance", by Wesley Goatley and
Georgina Voss
14. "WWF Endangered Species Pixelated Art", by
WWF and Mikami Yoshiyuki
My Position
12.
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14.
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13.
11.
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7.
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10.
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Personal favourites:
6. "Popsicles of Pollution", by students from National
Taiwan University of the Arts
10. "The Midnight Gospel", by Pendleton Ward and
Duncan Trussell
7. "Arcadia", by Hiroshi Sugimoto
3. "Person in Red", by Kamiya Jokar
1. "I love Alaska", by Submarine Channel (Youtube)
Findings:
It seems from this matrix that manipulating data while still creating a meaningful work is more frequently achieved with figurative representations, with a lot of details and layers of meaning that can be added.
My position is a bit tilted towards manipulating data because I'm interested in the artistic part of data visualisation, but still I don't want to create stories that are a form of escapism from reality, unless there is a degree of irony and an experiment involved (like in "Person in Red").
Legend:
1. "I love Alaska", by Submarine Channel (Youtube)
2. "Leaves of Grass", by Geoffrey Farmer
3. "Person in Red", by Kamiya Jokar
4. "Tattoo Biosensors"
5. "Google Earth Timelapse"
6. "Popsicles of Pollution", by students from National
Taiwan University of the Arts
7. "Arcadia", by Hiroshi Sugimoto
8. "Yellow Dust", by Nerea Calvillo with Raúl Nieves,
Pep Tornabell, Yee Thong Chai, Emma Garnett,
Marina Fernandez.
9. "Wage Islands", by Ekene Ijeoma
10. "The Midnight Gospel", by Pendleton Ward and
Duncan Trussell
11. "Sunspiring", by Oscar Sharp and Ross Goodwin
12. "Camera Restricta" by Philipp Schmitt
13. "Ground Resistance", by Wesley Goatley and
Georgina Voss
14. "WWF Endangered Species Pixelated Art", by
WWF and Mikami Yoshiyuki
5.
6.
8.
11.
10.
3.
12.
1.
2.
14.
9.
4.
7.
13.
My Position
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