“Karl Marx Gnome leading the liberation of the world’s Data Gnomes”

Karl Marx Gnome leading the liberation of the world’s Data Gnomes

Karin + Shane Denson
Solid concrete

The six “Data Gnomes” are simultaneously products and agents of data mining. Their faces were hand-sculpted in accordance with a data-capture process, utilizing Luke Caldwell’s “benevolent spyware” for the purpose of generating “Data Portraits” on the basis of personal Internet usage. The hand-sculpted Karl Marx Gnome leads the resistance of the miners, demonstrating that “all that’s solid does NOT melt into zeroes and ones.” For more info about the process and motivation for making these gnomes, be sure to scan the “Tutorial Level” painting (a QR code painting with the word “START” in green letters), which you’ll find hanging near the entrance of the exhibition space or in a previous post on this blog.