[ISEA2013] Panel: Ian McArthur – Creativity and Participatory Urbanism in China

Panel Statement

This session focuses on the emergent creative economy in China and the potential for big data to leverage and curate social intelligence through participatory data visualisation. “Chuangyi jingji” (the creative economy) is now seen in China as a key economic force driving the shift from ‘Made in China’ to ‘Created in China’. Supported by research and policy reform, China’s creative and cultural industries have seen explosive growth in recent years, and this rapid expansion is anticipated in government circles to have an unprecedented and far-reaching influence on the future of the country. Researchers from The Institute of Cultural Industries based at The Communication University of China (CUC) present new data, phenomenon analysis and case studies on the proliferation of art parks and creative clusters in China, and discuss the emergence of new digital media, including micro-film and video websites, and microblogs such as Weibo. We live in an era of unprecedented urbanisation of which China is an extreme example. Saturated in digital air, cities cluster around resources representing various interests and agendas creating inevitably complex systems. Big data, the mobile internet, social media and the Internet of Things (IOT) generate more information than ever, but the aggregation of social intelligence remains far from realising its potential. The annual GeoCity Smart City exhibition and symposium by China Museum of Digital Art, Beijing is a platform for collaborative research and innovation in media, art, technology and science. It explores synchronised curation of information design in urban contexts, using big data to unveil new possibilities for channelling and motivating fragmented interests into strands of positive energy and driving force.

  • Ian McArthur is a hybrid practitioner and a design academic at the University of New South Wales, College of Fine Arts, Sydney. In 2001-2003 Ian was Program Director of Graphic Design at La Salle DHU (Donghua University, Shanghai) where he initiated The Collabor8 Project (C8) an ongoing research platform that fosters creative collaboration between China and Australia. His recent work with Brad Miller (2011 – 2012) utilises granular and generative synthesis, mobile technologies, open source platforms and protocols to create experimental sonifications for responsive media environments that have been exhibited in Australia and China.