2013
Carbon Drawings
A Semiconductor work by Ruth Jarman and Joe Gerhardt.

365 Days of Data is a series of four carbon drawings made using data collected by four instruments installed on an experimental Flux Tower at the Alice Holt Research Forest, UK. Each drawing represents a year of data for each instrument; CO2, 3-d wind, temperature and water vapour. The drawings have been produced using custom techniques to translate the scientific data into tangible forms. The drawing process has been realised by scratching into carbon paper using a computational plotter. Semiconductor hand-made the carbon paper employing techniques used by volcanologists they met in Ecuador to record seismic events.

The hand-made quality of the carbon paper is employed to suggest the presence of the human observer trying to make sense of the world. Yet, there’s also a precision which comes with the data, bringing structure and rhythm and creating a sense of complexity to what we see. This conversation between analogue and digital plays with the divide between how science represents nature and how we experience it.

These carbon drawings form part of Semiconductors installation Data Projector.
Data Projector was made during a research and development period for Jerwood Open Forest and exhibited at Jerwood Space, London, January and February 2014.
Data courtesy of Matthew Wilkinson, Forest Research scientist.