hqq – secE – LookingOutwards09

Rachel Park sure can look outwards. 

I’m really inspired by a project she found when researching in Week 7 called Digital Calligraffiti:

^Video trailer for the project

Calligraffiti isn’t necessarily new or groundbreaking – in fact, it’s become an important movement in the development of the underground organized abstract vandalism movement. However, in this project, the Public Art Lab did things a little differently. Digital Calligraffiti is a project that bands together refugees with visual and graphic designers to create art and computational visualizations to raise awareness of social justice issues.

The project acts as a canvas for refugees to express issues that they face in a universally noticeable medium. The installation took place throughout public spaces in Berlin in 2016 and served to help normalize the voices of refugees in a country whose influx of Syrian refugees proved to be a contentious point of debate to native Germans.

The project uses a computational derivation of a font scheme to allow refugees to partner with visual designers to create uniquely serifed and expressive works of art.

I’m inspired by pieces like this because it bands together designers with those whose voices are often silenced. These kinds of partnerships use computing for social good to help raise the perspectives of the underprivileged to the forefront of the public eye.