Sex and Numbers: Pleasure, Reproduction, and Digital Biopolitics

Below you’ll find the recorded talk that I offered for my scheduled plenary at the 2019 Digital Humanities Summer Institute. Due to back injuries (discussed in the beginning of the talk), I was not able to present in person. Instead the DHSI team played this recorded talk. I virtually attended on twitter as well to make it possible to have some Q&A. I’ve included the text of the talk at […]

New Connections Workshop

I concur with my colleague Jamie Winterton that “cyber” has become overdetermined and if you’re into understanding how that works you should check out her upcoming event with the Center for Science and Imagination. “Cyber” simultaneously looks to be urgently everywhere while also remaining mystifying for many beyond whatever pleasure there may be in police procedurals. Additionally, while poking fun at a certain someone’s invocation of “the cybers” is an important […]

DataPLAY Debuts

FemTechNet’s signal/noise conference, held in Ann Arbor (MI) this weekend, hosted the debut of Vibrant Lives’ DataPLAY. Below is our playbill, which evokes early American playbills that were used to advertise formal theatrical events as well as technological experiences and new medical practices, like those at the World’s Fair or in smaller traveling techno-operas and shows. In many ways the bill and the notion of a debut suggests a polished performance […]

The data playground we sort of knew we were making

A quick overview Last weekend Vibrant Lives premiered three new sculptures commissioned by the Mesa Arts Center. The sculptures, created in collaboration with local artist Bobby Zokaites, were designed to give people a larger-scale experience of real time data shed than we had done in previous events. We consciously chose materials and shapes that would invite bodies to lay, stand, sit, and stretch across the pieces, allowing people to locate […]

Vibrant Lives at Spark! Festival

Vibrant Lives will be premiering three unique, interactive sculptures at the Spark! Mesa Festival of Creativity, in Mesa, AZ March 18 – 19, 2016  (12pm – 10pm). Our sculptures were constructed in partnership with local sculptor, Bobby Zokaites, and are designed to give festival-goers a sense of their real-time “data shed.” We will also be holding improvisatory performances both nights of the festival. The sculptures use festival-goers’ mobile phone data to produce touch-based […]