The Data Materialization Studio conducts research into the affective, aesthetic and theoretical implications of classic approaches as well as emerging modes of data materialization. Drawing upon practice-based methods grounded within aesthesis, our projects work to expose and critically analyze the material processes that mediate between the physical supports of computation and the digital phenomena that they articulate.

Current projects include research into: the aesthetic surfaces of 3D printing; the translation of tacit knowledge when working between physical and virtual environments; the use of DIY maker tools as an effective means of communicating affective information; artists’ aesthetic materialization of media temporality; and critical explorations of mundane digital tools through “gestural” and historical analyses.  

This work is intended to counter the political ramifications of “rhetorical dematerialization,” while simultaneously developing interpretive strategies for negotiating new modes of materiality that are emerging in cultural response to ubiquitous computing.