Hemo-resonance #1 is the first in an on-going series of art works exploring data representation and the quantified self in relation to type 1 diabetes. The work turns my blood glucose readings and insulin injection amounts from a 100 day period into resonances for visitors to feel through interactions with vibrational media. Building on data visualization and sonification, I explore the possibilities of data resonance. In Hemo-resonance #1 two vibrotactile devices are presented for visitors to touch – one vibrates in response to my blood sugar measurements, the other in response to the amount of insulin I injected based on each of those blood sugar measurements. In the accompanying, synchronized video the same vibrations are applied to a table on which the test strips I used in the 100 days are laid. Resonances in the table cause the hundreds of small black and white strips to continually shift position, creating fleeting patterns. The work juxtaposes these sensations with the constant search for patterns through data collection.
Samuel Thulin is a researcher and artist working at the intersection of mobilities research, communication and media studies, sound studies, and critical disability studies. He is a Horizon Postdoctoral Fellow at Concordia University working in the Milieux Institute’s Participatory Media cluster. Throughout his academic and artistic career, Thulin has investigated how relationships to place, space, and location are entangled with multiple (im)mobilities and with developments in mobile communication technology. Thulin’s latest research-creation works explore vibrational media and the potential of the concept of resonance to contribute to understanding material relationships between different types of bodies (both human and non-human) that provide a different reading, and experience, of disease and disability.