Awardee: Ana Mosquera

Primary Artistic Medium: Multidisciplinary

Idea

As the city moved indoors to mitigate the consequences of COVID-19, digital data production and consumption escalated in an already expanding digital  economy. Living a more online life has not necessarily meant a more intimate relationship with our data or an expanded awareness of how it is constantly compiled and recorded by platforms far from our reach.  We can feel dependent on our digital existence yet disconnected from it and its value.

Data production and collection can only acquire value when we are able to engage with it. This project will explore daily uses of digital data in a way that helps us explore the digital footprint of the city of Philadelphia. For this purpose I will extract content that is georeference to the city of Philadelphia from different social media (Twitter, Instagram, Youtube) and create an archive of digital files. The digital files will be transformed into patterns to create textile samples, which will then be stitched together as  a quilt, bringing together the content of the archive. The textile will also be annotated with  information collected during the scrapping process to reflect on its relevance to different Philadelphian neighborhoods and their digital landscape.

The tapestry will be displayed as a backdrop for itinerant live performances or speaking corners, where participants can be invited to explore and comment on the content of the archive. The speaking corners can happen either online via live streaming or later on in real life open or close venues. I feel the idea of a speaking corner could continuously generate opportunities for the city of Philadelphia, because it provides an opportunity to call diverse members of society to  gather (online or physically) to share and talk about things that are relevant to their communities.