Dear Data: Pen pals in a data age

A quick profile of Dear Data, a lovely ‘artisan visualisation’ concept from the brains and pens of Giorgia Lupi and Stefanie Posavec. It has had plenty of coverage on other sites and on social media this week but I wanted to briefly mention it for anybody else out there yet to come across it.

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The essence of Dear Data is “how two girls who switched continents get to know each other through a collection of handmade postcards: small data-driven self-portraits they draw and send across the pond each week”.

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Each week they pick a new theme about their lives, small events or interactions, record the data over the coming week and then find uniquely individual ways to represent this data. Using postcards as their canvas, they hand draw their visual stories and then exchange them via post. It is an entirely contemporary form of being pen pals.

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They are currently working through week 28, with week 8 the latest delivery shared on their site portraying ‘phone addiction’. Such a super idea that so beautifully emphasises the personal, unique perspectives we all bring to data and to visualisation.