Data Humanism with Giorgia Lupi

As we are ramping up at our new location, we won't have snacks or drinks yet at this event.

Data is now recognized as one of the founding pillars of our economy, and the notion that the world grows exponentially richer in data every day is already yesterday’s news.

Big Data doesn’t belong to a distant dystopian future; it’s a commodity and an intrinsic and iconic feature of our present—like dollars, concrete, automobiles and Helvetica. The ways we relate to data are evolving more rapidly than we realize, and our minds and bodies are naturally adapting to this new hybrid reality built of both physical and informational structures. And visual design—with its power to instantly reach out to places in our subconscious without the mediation of language, and with its inherent ability to convey large amounts of structured and unstructured information across cultures—is going to be even more central to this silent but inevitable revolution.

What are some of the key challenges that we, as designers, will need to address in out future with data? How can we start questioning the impersonality of a merely technical approach to data, and to begin designing ways to connect numbers to what they really stand for?

The talk will provide some key ideas on how we can move forward.

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Giorgia Lupi is an award-winning information designer and artist.

Her work in information visualization frequently crosses the divide between digital and print, exploring visual models and metaphors to represent dense and rich data-driven stories. Her work and research challenges the impersonality that data might communicate, designing engaging visual narratives able to connect numbers to what they stand for: knowledge, behaviors, people.

She is co-founder and design director at Accurat (http://www.accurat.it/), a data-driven research, design and innovation firm based in Milan and New York.

She is co-author Dear Data (https://www.amazon.com/Dear-Data-Giorgia-Lupi/dp/1616895322/) in collaboration with data artist Stefanie Posavec, published by Penguin, Particular Books in the UK, and by Princeton Architectural Press in North America. Dear Data has been recently nominated for the DesignMuseum Beazley Designs of the Year 2016, and is among the finalists for the Innovation By Design Awards 2016.

Dear Data has recently been acquired by the Museum of Modern Art (https://medium.com/@giorgialupi/dear-data-has-been-acquired-by-moma-but-this-isnt-what-we-are-most-excited-about-bdaa3376d9db#.mj3c5ybi2), part of its permanent collection.

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