Creative Synthesis

The thoughts and works of the Creative Synthesis Collaborative.

Historian Shae Davidson's research interests include public policy and the relationship between culture and civil society. His publications range from articles on industrial history to absurdist poetry.

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Destroyed Landscapes

Posted on May 9th by Shae Davidson.
Terranova Vision uses landscape art as a tool for both saving communities affected by large-scale resource extraction or political conflict and creating works that encourage awareness of environmental issues ...
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Perception Mapping

Posted on May 7th by Shae Davidson.
A current project by artist and designer Christian Nold explores non-visual and non-aural perceptions of space and landscape. The Sensory Deprivation Map reflects the experiences of pairs of participants—one of ...
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Regenerative Development

Posted on May 6th by Shae Davidson.
Sante Fe-based planning and design consults the Regenesis Group approach sustainable development in a way that fully integrates place into the processes of restoration, growth, and ecologically-friendly use.  Rather than viewing ...
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Collaborative Water Solutions

Posted on April 30th by Shae Davidson.
Following a cross-country trip and a series of works in which she explored the nature of public space, performance artist Betsy Damon realized the importance of social networks in the creation of art ...
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Driving East

Posted on April 28th by Shae Davidson.
The ideal of the open road has served as a way to examine contemporary life and the nature of change and growth. Some have taken this fascination with movement and ...
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Participatory Urbanism

Posted on April 23rd by Shae Davidson.
Interested in the ways in which mobile technology influences social development and the urban landscape, research boutique Urban Atmospheres has built an ongoing project on the belief that cell phones and other ...
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Transportation: Piece by Piece

Posted on April 21st by Shae Davidson.
The effects of mobility on life in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, as well as concerns about the connection between energy consumption and changing conceptualizations of space and distance, inspired a ...
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Something Old, Something New on Hollywood Boulevard

Posted on April 18th by Shae Davidson.
As a move to counter the miasma of gentrification and celebrate the street's blended heritage--incorporating waves of migration and development, pop culture pilgrimage with lived urban experience--the Los Angeles Forum for ...
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Full Spectrum

Posted on April 16th by Shae Davidson.
Appearing as part of the upcoming Synthetic Times exhibit in Beijing, the Wifi Camera creates images based on the electromagnetic signals from wireless networks rather than the spectrum of light visible to ...
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Esprit de Corps

Posted on April 14th by Shae Davidson.
During my time as a museum director, I came into regular contact with the US Army Corps of Engineers through the agency’s efforts to explore archaeological sites and promote historic preservation in ...
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Imaging Beijing

Posted on April 11th by Shae Davidson.
John Craig Freeman's Imaging Beijing, part of the 2008 Mixed Realities exhibition at Turbulence.org, uses remote sensing technology and place-based narratives to examine the effects of electronic and cultural ...
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Virtual Perception and Paranoia

Posted on April 9th by Shae Davidson.
Daniel Freeman, a researcher at the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London, is leading a project that uses virtual public transportation to understand the nature of paranoia and social perception.  ...
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City Lights

Posted on April 7th by Shae Davidson.
The Helsinki-themed collaborative media and art project CityWall allows users to explore images and data gleaned from the Internet--particularly items from YouTube and Flickr.  With help from the Ubiquitous Interaction ...
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Campaigning Word by Word

Posted on April 4th by Shae Davidson.
Two recent visualization projects posted on Many Eyes--an offshoot of IBM's Collaborative User Experience research group--use  frequency diagrams to examine the tone and emphasis of recent political speeches.  Presenting ...
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Biomorphology and Water Sustainability

Posted on April 2nd by Shae Davidson.
Andrew Parker, a zoology faculty member at the University of Sydney, built his career exploring ways to model optical technology on the evolutionary adaptations seen in the eyes of animals.  He has turned his interest in ...