Data Audification & Physicalization

Never is there a moment when the world is truly quiet. The installation uses sound—a time-based medium—to represent the circadian rhythms of four species: Human (highest pitch), Mouse (nocturnal), Reindeer (free-running cycle), and Columbian Monkey (lunar cycle). Using P5.js to plot the data, each punched hole represents one hour of activity. Each animal’s data occupies a different pitch in the music box (a separate line of the paper strip), together creating the music of life.

As anthropocene changes affect animals’ circadian rhythms in many ways—for example, artificial light alters higher brain functions and associated neuronal activity in songbirds, and disrupts central and peripheral reproductive clocks, leading to altered uterine physiology and reduced pregnancy success in albino mice—this installation aims to promote synchronous harmony across species. Just like music, which cannot be composed of a single note, life requires interwoven rhythms.


Data Visualization

Inspired by the actogram—a scientific graphical representation of an organism’s phases of activity and rest over the course of a day—the visualization is rearranged into a format of 12 rows (months) and printed on translucent paper. By overlapping them, we can see how the black units gradually fill all the space.

The audification and visualization provide two different perspectives on the same set of information. While audification is time-based, offering the user a “live-in-the-moment” experience (an animal is active right now), visualization offers the overall picture of an entire year.