Adira Griffin

The Peach Pit, 2023, Digital Media, displayed on a 3072 x 1280 screen

The Peach Pit is a geospatial data visualization that reveals the disproportionate amount of pollution affecting Black communities in the state of Georgia. This project aims to bring awareness to the environmentally racist practices institutions employ when choosing places to build factories and dump waste. The data used in this project shows a correlation between air, water, and soil quality and the amount of pollution present in Black neighborhoods.

This work uses technology as an experiential tool by combining the imagined patterns of natural elements with geographical information of Georgia’s landscape. The aesthetic and patterns of nature and data are being experimented within a controlled environment. 

Invitation to Interact

Take time to follow the patterns and paths formed by each type of pollution represented in this animation. Do they fall alongside any landforms you know of in the area? What correlations are you able to find between the polluted areas and Georgia’s demographics?

This legend shows what each symbol on this data visualization means. There are five symbols: a green rectangle (representing the land pollution), a brown circle (representing the air pollution), a blue oval (representing the water pollution), a gray star (representing superfund sites*), and a blue blob (representing Georgia’s Black population). The pollution data is collected from an EPA environmental justice database. The demographic data is from www.statisticalatlas.com.

Stuart Romm, Amy Landesberg, Hudson Treu, and Jordan Graves

Gather the Forest

16’ x 40’ Interactive Digital Display

Come to the Media Bridge and find a dynamic sky with a few awaiting trees. Look up through the roots: That’s where the tree community intertwines. Connect to engage the latent forest and add a tree. You have to be there. Others who come by or that you might bring with you also add trees to the stand. A sympathetic human group gathers, and together builds the forest stand. Afforestation of the image takes place, and the nascent community assemblage shares the capacity to act.

Gather to celebrate the spectacular canopy that makes Atlanta a tree haven, a City in the Forest.  Our canopy is vulnerable. You can act: Plant trees with Trees Atlanta: www.treesatlanta.org

The Site – Media Bridge Vital discourse, whether textual or visual, initiates a bridge between diverse positions and viewpoints. Our intent for Gather the Forest is to achieve working interaction between passers-by, to reward curiosity and exploration, to invite mutual introductions, and to do so through the example of the beneficial interdependency of a forest community.

A forest?

A tree is never alone. Like all living things, it belongs to a community of organisms that depend on each other. Think of the great sequoias: Their roots are all connected, and they hold each other up. Just a few feet below the ground is their massive, interconnected support system. They intertwine to share nutrients and nurture one another.

This Forest?

After dreaming the forest scene in digital modeling software, tree models were exported individually for feeding into an AI image generation tool. Using an image-to-image model, the AI process systematically added an enhanced degree of realism unachievable through standard modeling processes, uniquely to each tree.

The installation is written in JavaScript and runs in the web browser. This code removes backgrounds from the AI-generated images and layers them into one composition with varying opacities. The installation uses a Node.js server to handle communication between viewer’s devices and the installation display. To encourage gathering on site, geolocation is used to only allow participation when near the bridge.  

How to gather? 

Scan the QR code on the Media Bridge screen and connect to a web page with instructions.

Inspired Action Design (IAD) - Collaborators: Hunter Spence, Joel Krieger, Matt Lewis, Mauricio Talero (Graphic Design)

"Diodic Communeco", 2023, Generative Web Particle Animation on LED Tiles

What if our community, our surrounding ecosystem, and our technology could Pause, and Breathe, and Communicate - Together - in a shared cadence of dialogue, thought, and meditation?

“Diodic Communeco” bridges these three actors together, beyond simple coexistence, into an extended community and one consciousness, transforming the Library’s Media Bridge into an expanded lens allowing us to peer into our interconnected possible futures. The Bridge allows us to both investigate and face possibilities, to shed the carbon tunnel vision that separates us, and to embrace shared rethinking, dialogue, and an openness to explore the complex interconnected systems beyond the current limited views that dominate public dialogue.

Through their mobile phones, passersby are able to engage with a cybernetic animated forest of particles that listen, breathe, peer into the future, and deliver prophecies of an expanded vision of sustainability.

How to Interact

When at the Media Bridge, scan the QR code that appears on the screen for “Diodic Communeco” to learn more. Through their mobile phones, passersby are able to engage with a cybernetic animated forest of particles that listen, breathe, peer into the future, and deliver prophecies of an expanded vision of sustainability. If you too seek other ways of knowing, connecting, regenerating, and thriving, we invite you to ask the Bridge and get answers.