- What did you learn?
I learned a lot about the health code behind the scene and the system is currently been operated across the country. The topic related to the pandemic seemed to me to be an at-the-moment thing but throughout the research, I have learned the infrastructures that have been implemented to cope with are bringing permanent effects. I have also come to more understanding of the Chinese changing political environment. - What feedback did you receive? Any reflections on critique itself?
I received a lot of feedback on how the project might bring change to its audiences. Getting the feedback questions are very helpful for me to re-assuring my goals for creating it. Marina asked me during the critique “Now they have known the information, what they can do” this actually pushes me into thinking about how the interactivity could be played out after I send out the messages. Monika has also suggested that I should include part of my experience that led me into doing this project in the first place in my artist statement and I do agree by doing so to have a realistic solid foundation for the statement itself. - What might you do differently in terms of process or content?
In terms of the process, because the topic itself is changing very actively on daily bases, so I would have given more attention to the news section just to understand where the overwhelming concerns are for the nation and its citizens. - What was inspiring? What parts?
Reviewing and constantly revising the project form was inspiring for me. Having specific design intentions gives many potentials for how the forms could be and how the interaction could happen. Having these intentions in mind keeps pushing me to revise and rethink other possibilities. - Revisit the assignment prompts: how did your project relate to the original prompts, in terms of critical lens, audience, tone, etc…
My critical lens was learning health code system is an implementation that was built under both the pandemic and political campaign, the right of acknowledging the mechanism that has been running behind the scene and also ethics responding to this technological arrangement.
The audience for the experience was pedestrians who by chance encountered me wearing the shirt (mainly Chinese citizens because I live in Shanghai, but also people who can read English to avoid sensitive language) .
The tone for the experience is supposed to be revealing other than feeling under censorship, confused, or unsafe. - How did you balance research and experimentation? Which is easier for you? How can you focus more on the areas that you shy away from?
The research and experimentation balance came very naturally to me for this project because eventually, my goal is to deliver audiences an experience of how internet consensus looks and how taking control of the technology we use feels like. Research is more comfortable for me in this case because is a hot topic so I can easily find people’s different takes on their perspectives.
The skills required to make the project functional are demanding so I will just spend more time figuring out, even a functional proof of concept.