data draws data

an exhibition by BarabásiLab curated by George Fifield
Exhibition Dates: Friday, April 15, 2022 - Sunday, May 22, 2022
Gallery Hours: Fridays - Sundays, 12pm-6pm

Boston Cyberarts is excited to present an exhibition by BarabásiLab, curated by Cyberarts Director George Fifield, on view in the gallery from Friday, April 15th - Sunday, May 22nd, 2022.

This exhibition presents the BarabásiLab, a scientist and artist collective lead by the physicist and network scientist Albert-László Barabási (*1967, Cârța, Romania) at Northeastern University in Boston, USA. Over the past 25 years, BarabásiLab has developed a visual vocabulary for complex systems, often relying on forms of expression taken from art. Today, more data is produced per day than was previously produced in decades. The world’s knowledge doubles every two years. To cope with this amount of data, new science is needed: the visualization of characteristic nodes and networks, of parameters and patterns.

By making visible the hidden connections and repeating patterns within nature, society, and culture, the innovative and interdisciplinary field of network science enables the analysis of a wide variety of cultural and social phenomena. Network science is now used in medicine, pharmacy, and physics, but also in fields such as the study of infrastructures, social systems, and developmental processes.

This exhibition's aim is to provide a comprehensive overview of the forms of visualization developed by BarabásiLab through its collaborative process involving scientists, artists, and designers alike. Without imposing a reductionist framework on the complexity of our world, the work of BarabásiLab reveals the hidden patterns in complex systems that determine our biological and social existence.