Once a viewer walked into the dim, round room where Terre Natale was exhibited in Paris a couple years ago, they were immersed in brightly colored animations displaying global population and immigration statistics and their possible affects on the planet. Grey dots resembling static fly about a map showing migration patterns, flags drop into slots like Tetris conveying where remittances from immigrants are sent (video above), and lines resembling seismic read outs communicate which cities are the fastest growing. This is the type of project Michael Zick Doherty has been involved in.
Using technology to educate, inform, and connect people is at the heart of Doherty’s work. A designer in the broadest sense of the word, he has been a part of a number of projects that integrate physical spaces with technology that facilitates communication with distant people, creatively displays large amounts of data, or interacts with users to help them find the information they seek.
“What it really comes down to is education as a way of empowering people to find their own solutions,” he says.
But while the Terre project was global in scope, Doherty thinks the key to solving worldwide issues is to start locally. “If we do not know how to solve problems on a local level within our own community, how can we begin to approach issues at a global scale?” he posits. “Along with this is the idea of the U.S. as a model for other countries. We should be using our influence to encourage sustainable living.”
He recognizes the vast power of the internet to place enormous amounts of information at our fingertips, but finds issues with navigating and acting on all that data. “The internet provides access to all the information we could ever need. But there are some questions that still can’t be answered by the internet,” says Doherty, who is a graduate student at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. “How do we find answers to these questions?”
Community networks, both virtual and physical, is his answer. Online forums — like Yahoo! Answers or Instructables, where individuals discuss their problems and projects — combined with regional networking, like Meetup.com.
He plans to act on this approach through urban gardening, one of his passions. The lack of greenery in his hometown of Los Angeles and the amount of waste created by our food system led him to this field. “I believe if we had a stronger connection to the food we eat, this wouldn’t be as much the case.”
Redesigning the Windowfarms community network website to make it more user friendly will be his first project in this area. The site is currently a social network dedicated to indoor window gardens, and he would like to heighten the activity of local groups that are already active there. “It is both local and global,” the Bushwick transplant says. “It provides the information, the global network, and the local resources" to assist individuals in growing food locally by means of DIY projects.
He also plans to start teaching workshops in Brooklyn where anyone can come to learn how to build such a garden. If you are interested in attending, he will teach a workshop on June 5th at Williamsburg’s The Change You Want To See. To sign up, contact the good folks at DoTank:Brooklyn. To see other works or ideas of Doherty’s, check his blog, Neu Future.
