Jordan Shaw

The conceptual approach behind the Vector Festival 2020's exhibition space stems from the current cultural zeitgeist. The thought was to integrate a form of anonymized data visualization or influence based on the platform's web traffic. In a way, the festival's platform will become a living and breathing anonymous artifact of those who visited, viewed and participated on the platform and with the festival. It will highlight the unique situation we are all in and try to create some form of digital representation of our connectedness despite being physically isolated in one capacity or another. We may struggle to process our connectedness tangibly, but the concept for the Vector Festival 2020 is not only an exhibition platform but an invitation to discuss our online shared experiences, participation and connectivity online during COVID-19.

The subtle visual cues that present themselves on the platform's background represent the real-time presence of other visitors on the site who are joining, leaving, scrolling, clicking and navigating around the festival. Through the shared visual representation of physical and digital interactions, the goal is to encourage discussion and contemplation about remote collaborative viewing and joint online participation other than video, voice or text. What does it look like when we attempt to translate the busyness and embodied physical and spatial cues of our actions and interactions experienced in the physical pubic sphere and recontextualize them to hold meaning in an online environment?

The Vector Festival 2020 website was done in collaboration with: Rebecca Wilkinson, Emi Takahashi and Marcelo Luft.

http://2020.vectorfestival.org