Day-to-Day
Data is the curatorial project of artist Ellie
Harrison. During post-graduate study at Goldsmiths College in 2003, Ellie
developed an interest, within her own practice, in the collection and interpretation
of data from within her everyday life. She wrote a dissertation exploring The
Role of the Artist in the Interpretation and Reinterpretation of the Data of
Everyday Life. When she left college, she became aware of a real trend
in this area of practice after attending the Data-Based
Art Seminar at the BALTIC and discovering the work of artists:
Lucy Kimbell, Steven Barrett and Abigail
Reynolds.
It became apparent that there was a demand for an exhibition
exploring this field of work, in order to provide a forum for discussion about
artists working with data and using their own daily lives as research material.
At the end of March 2004, the Arts Council England funded Ellie Harrison to
research and create a proposal for a touring themed group exhibition around
this subject area, which later became Day-to-Day Data.
Selection Process
During this research period the first version of the Day-to-Day Data
website was created and launched. In May 2004, an international ‘call
for submissions’ was announced on many mailing lists and websites (including
Artsadmin, Artdeadline, Artquest, British Arts, Ideas Factory and You Are Here),
together with an eighth page colour advert in the June 2004 edition of AN magazine
(page 46). A vast number of submissions were received. Selection took place
on 5 & 6 July 2004 in the Faculty
of Taxonomy office at ISIS
Arts in Newcastle. The selectors were Ellie Harrison and Sarah
Cook with help from Saul
Albert.
Exhibition Development Workshop
Ten artists were selected to attend the Day-to-Day Data Exhibition
Development Workshop, held at the Angel
Row Gallery in Nottingham on 23 & 24 August 2004. The two-day workshop
became the concluding element of the five month research and development stage
of Day-to-Day Data, funded by the Arts Council England. The initial
budget paid the ten selected artists’ expenses to attend.
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The Exhibition Development Workshop provided the attending
artists the opportunity to present and discuss their work with the group and
allowed some of the artists the opportunity to physically experiment with data
collection. Through a combination of presentations and experiments, the workshop
encouraged discussions into the notions of working with data in the context
of everyday life. Ideas developed through the workshop period went on to provide
the beginning of the conceptual backdrop for the theme of Day-to-Day Data.