Leaflets, Folds, and Data Shadows

Carsten Becker, by contrast, explores a very different form of visual representation, data detail, and digital shadow projection. A graduate of the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, he is developing an ambitious project titled Kontrollorgan (Control Organ), which reflects the individual data shadow generated by the growing number of electronically traceable activities.

As a self-experiment, Becker first compiled the ingredients of his own data trail into a database—reviewing phone bills, bank statements, email inboxes, and the browser history of his web sessions. He assigned each type of data its own symbols and modes of visualisation, which the program merges on screen into a constantly changing data portrait: “The program links a person’s data streams, analyses them, and generates a three-dimensional form.”

The result is a curious rotating figure composed of symbols, lines, colour crystals, numbers and text fragments, spinning on its own axis. A modified video remote allows the viewer to navigate the installation via infrared interface along a timeline. Depending on the content of the daily data shadow, the shape and constellation of the Kontrollorgan continuously transform.

Becker sees the project as only just beginning: “For future installations, the data trail could also be generated as a kind of performance—perhaps live at an exhibition or festival. It’s also conceivable to feed the data into the Kontrollorgan in real time. The data shadow would then evolve live.”