Continuing the outcomes, brainstorming and research after the Positions Through Dialogue brief, I decided to focus on a thread that connects identity / social research / surveillance. I decided to explore self-surveillance as a tool to collect data. The idea was to collect as much data as possible, focusing on quantity -> Using my own experience as a mirror to data collection. The first week, I was focusing on collecting different types of data from my phone and I started with visualisations. Following to the week 2, I collected and visualised more data and printed them into a publication that serves as a diary/archive.
This experimental and exploratory publication is in response to the first two weeks of methods of triangulating brief. It serves as a diary and archive of self-surveillance-driven visualizations that can be continued, and expanded. It investigates the idea of identity and self-surveillance through data collection and data visualization. The publication operates as a real-time data diary. The data were gathered and collected by observing and engaging with the data on my phone during the period of 4/9-8/10/2023.
By collecting and visualizing data from my phone, my aim was to explore different angles of the topics of surveillance and identity, which I had been researching in my previous studio practice. Focusing on personal and introspective aspects of surveillance, the goal was to find ways to advance my research and open new possibilities for the direction my work can take. The idea was to create a project that monitors my actions and provides an understanding of my own digital behaviour and how it relates to my identity. In my previous work, I focused on collecting data from others through interviews, so this shift in focus allows for a more personal and introspective exploration.
The activity of collecting my own data, visualizing it, and giving it a physical medium serves as a parallel to the constant data collection happening in today’s surveillance society, highlighting the pervasive nature of surveillance.
Feedback from the class and from talking with student teaching assistants:
Needs more story telling / be clearer in what I am communicating / how to communicate the personal experience
If you want to communicate that the data collected shape our (digital/shadow) identities, how can you do it?
A little bit too neat and linear – considering I want to communicate the overwhelming, pervasive nature of surveillance
Tip: Try to focus more on a type and layout, rather than data visualisations to create the overwhelming feeling
Continue in data collecting to collect bigger amounts and also more persona data too, to communicate the pervasive nature