emaf 2012, Dominikanerkirche Osnabrück
javabased tools for surveillance -, analysis- and screeningsoftware, database with 8 million Webcam-JPGs, trashhit USB interface
Trash hits constitutes data mining on the crisis, that measures its impact in an alternative manner. An exemplary trash can in a German pedestrian zone was recorded by webcam in June 2009 and June 2010, dumping 4-5 jpg´s per second in case the program detected movement close to the can. This is where the last remnants of consumption are discarded and taken out again. In the statistical evaluation of these events the can prooved to be a scene of social change.
The growing poverty can be seen in the shift of the ratio of what is placed into the trash can and what is taken out of it. Both years are shown in synchronicity, browsing through time, forwarding to the elected hits the viewer selects - dumping, searching+finding and/or cleaning. The installation shows how actual events become numbers and thereby triggers associated questions. Statistical reality is re-constructed by means of system- atical empirical data collection, whereby the documented actual events have an immediate and visible representation in the numbers. The experience of this transparent conversion of data creates the perception of an alternative information that is in contrast to the official statistics.
Thanks to Fernando Crespo, Jens Heise, Stephan Blanché.
