Join the opening reception of the Citizens Data Agency, a fictional service provider proposing five speculative data support services.
Explore this interactive exhibition showcasing the outcomes of a series of co-design workshops which were part of a year-long research project which aims to spark conversations about the challenges people will face around data privacy in the future and what kinds of support services we might need.
Citizens Data Agency is an interactive exhibition of a fictional service provider proposing five speculative data support services, showcasing the outcomes of a series of co-design workshops, part of a year-long research project which aims to spark conversations about the challenges people will face around data privacy in the future and what kinds of support…
Citizens Data Agency is an exhibition of a fictional service provider proposing five speculative data support services.
Join us at Inspace to explore the Citizens Data Agency, an interactive exhibition showcasing the outcomes of a series of co-design workshops, part of a year-long research project which aims to spark conversations about the challenges people will face around data privacy in the future and what kinds of support services we might need.
Join us in Inspace Gallery for the launch and reception of Citizen Data Agency Exhibition. This reception will include a short introduction from the researchers behind the project.
The Citizens Data Agency is a project by researchers in the Institute for Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh and seeks to explore what current and future data privacy support might look like for people from marginalised communities. We partnered with two community partners – Amina and Datakirk – who provide support for people from minority ethnic backgrounds. Through a series of participatory and co-design workshops the aim was to explore possible future speculative data support services designed around their experiences and needs.
Datakirk is an Edinburgh based social enterprise that aims to empower people from disadvantaged groups in the data economy by providing learner-centred training in data literacy and analytic skills.
Amina is a Scottish wide charity that empowers and supports Muslim and BME women by serving as a vital link between them and the barriers they face every day.
The project is funded by the UKRI National Research Centre on Privacy, Harm Reduction and Adversarial Influence Online (REPHRAIN) and Edinburgh Futures Institutes (EFI).
We are delighted to announce Nic Sandiland, artist and co-founder of creative production company Flexer&Sandiland, as our Inspace Artist-in-Residence this June. The focus of Sandiland’s residency will be on An Obscure Camera, an interactive moving image installation, incorporating a live camera feed, to explore notions of ‘following’, ‘public space’, ‘the everyday’ and the ‘camera’s gaze’.
First staged in Brighton Dome in 2023 as work in progress, during this residency in Inspace, Sandiland will explore collaborations and connections with researchers at the Institute for Design Informatics and the University’s wider community, to further develop this concept and prototype, towards a subsequent public launch later this year.
Through this Inspace Residency, Sandiland will spend the week testing and developing the current prototype:
‘It is a pleasure to have InSpace host and facilitate the ongoing development of An Obscure Camera. Not only does this help further develop our universites partnership, but it also provides a much-needed hub for transdisciplinary collaboration, drawing together expertise from the arts, technology, academic and cultural networks in a versatile and accommodating environment.’
Nic Sandiland
At the heart of this work is a sense of liveness, liveliness and embodiment, explored by Sandiland, by inviting visitors and viewers to participate in and interact with a live video feed, from the street right outside of Inspace, capturing passersby as they go about their daily activities. This live feed Sandiland playfully masks to create ‘portholes’ which allow the underlying image of the street scene to show through at various points, enabling installation viewers to choose to reveal any part of the projection they find interesting, and to reflect on what they choose to follow and what it feels like to do so.
The intention of this work is to encourage members of the public to take a more critical perspective on the use and processing of their data in public contexts, potentially providing significant benefits to their ongoing understanding and engagement with other forms of public surveillance.
This Artist-in-Residence is supported by Middelsex University and the Institute for Design Informatics
Important notice: This work involves the temporary installation of a street facing camera in the window of Inspace, which captures a live feed of passersby. Footage from this camera feed is being used as the input for the installation but none of the data is recorded or stored
Access the Data Protection Impact and Legitimate Interest Assessments here for more information.
If you have any feedback, questions or concerns about his project, please email:designinformatics@ed.ac.uk
The fascination with Camera Obscura has captured audience imagination drawing people worldwide from Victorian times to present day. The spectacle of entering a dark room through which to witness and actively peer out to the surrounding landscape is both theatrically enticing and technically mysterious. An Obscure Camera develops this form for a 21st-century context through a physically interactive installation.
We enter a large dark space and are immersed by a multitude of ornate Rococo frames projected onto the surrounding walls. Each frame contains a close-up view of the live outdoor environment outside of the building. As we walk around, the frames move with us, matching our speed and direction. New subjects enter and pass through the frames as our viewpoint changes. We canscan, track, and follow different features in the outdoor spaces, including its inhabitants, through our motion within the space.
Visitors are given the agency to physically enact the choices made by ubiquitous AI algorithms that observe, scrutinise, and categorise our every move.
In contrast to the minimal actions of clicking a mouse or pressing a key, a participant has to move their whole body through the installation in order to ‘follow’ those outside. This way, participants not only ‘embody the AI’, but are confronted, first-hand, with the associated ethical and social implications of their choices/actions.
About the Artist
Nic Sandiland is a UK based artist working across installation, performance, and film.
Through his work, Nic seeks to re-enliven the body, revisiting and revaluing the viewer’s actions through their innate physical presence. To do this, his work has drawn on cinematic techniques such as slow motion and moving camera mechanisms and, more recently, machine vision, LiDAR, and robotics.
Nic has made work in London, Europe and Southeast Asia and has presented at theatres, art galleries, and many unusual venues. His film work has been shown worldwide and has been broadcast on UK TV (Channel 4).
His work has been commissioned by organisations such as: the Royal Festival Hall, the Barbican Arts Centre, Sadler’s Wells Theatre and The Brighton Festival and he is a regular collaborator with choreographers Yael Flexer and Rosemary Lee.
He has also worked as an interactive technology designer with: Station House Opera, Blast Theory, Gary Stevens and Imogen Stidworthy. He is also a producer and editor for Extant Theatre, the UK’s leading professional performing arts company of visually impaired artists and theatre practitioners.
Nic has taught workshops on digital technology and dance around the World including: Bangalore, India and Seoul, South Korea. He also taught video production for 10 years at London Contemporary Dance School (MA dance for camera) and is currently a senior lecturer in fine art at Middlesex University. In 2022 Nic completed his PhD on agency within interactive installation.
Learn from the communities paving the way for Responsible AI development and discover the vital role of the arts & humanities in developing ethical AI futures.
Talk Details
Can artistic approaches help invite more voices into discussions about AI in Healthcare?
The potential benefits of utilising AI technology in healthcare are vast but there are important practical, technological, ethical, and legal implications that need to be addressed in order to safeguard patients. Doctor, AI researcher and artist Fiona Smith is particularly interested in how we can ethically curate the diverse datasets that are required to make accurate fair models. Join this discussion with Smith who will be talking about how these themes informed her latest exhibition “The BOX” which premiered at the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival. “The BOX” is the outcome of the Creator Residency ‘STEAM Imaging V’, hosted by Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Medicine MEVIS, in collaboration with the Institute for Design Informatics, the International Fraunhofer Talent School Bremen & the School Center Walle supported by Ars Electronica.
The BOX is the artistic outcome of the Creator in Residence Programme ’STEAM Imaging V Holding the ‘Digital’ in Medicine to Account’, hosted by Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Medicine MEVIS, Bremen, Germany, in collaboration with the Institute for Design Informatics, Edinburgh, the International Fraunhofer Talent School Bremen, and the School Center Walle, Bremen, Germany, supported by Ars Electronica, Linz, Austria.
Please note limited seats are available at Inspace for in-person audiences, so please book tickets in advance. For those joining online please visit the online event page for the Zoom joining link and password.
*Important Notice*
This event will be photographed, recorded and live streamed and the data published online and used for research, promotional and reporting purposes by BRAID UK and the Institute for Design Informatics based at the University of Edinburgh. For further information please contact the organisers.
Event details
Thurs, 11 Apr 2024 4-5pm Free | Booking required
3-4pm – Recommended viewing of the experience (join an hour before the event to view the experience as the exhibition will be closed during and after the seminar)
16.00 – Welcome by Caterina Moruzzi 16.10 – Talk by Dr Fiona Smith 16.40 – Q&A 17.00 – End
The event starts at 16:10 to allow time for in-person audiences including staff and students to move around campus. Zoom Webinar will open from 16:00 for online audiences
Speaker & host
Guest speaker Dr Fiona Smith is a doctor and an AI researcher whose passion for art has led her to exploring multimedia approaches for public engagement throughout her career.
Fiona is a graduate of the University of St Andrews and the University of Manchester Medical Schools. She completed her foundation training in South East Scotland and her Plastic Surgery Themed Core Surgical Training in North East England. In 2021 she joined the CDT for Biomedical AI at the University of Edinburgh, where in addition to investigating AI applications in surgery for her PhD, she is a tutor for Case Studies in AI Ethics.
Caterina Moruzzi, our host, is a Chancellor’s Fellow in the Institute for Design Informatics, School of Design and research affiliate of the Edinburgh’s Futures Institute at the University of Edinburgh. Her research lies at the intersection between the philosophy of art, history and philosophy of human and artificial creativity, and the philosophy of AI. She holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Nottingham and an artist diploma in piano performance from the Conservatorio G.B.Martini, Bologna, Italy. In her ongoing projects, she collaborates with researchers, artists, and technology companies to investigate modes of shared agency and creativity between humans, data, and technology.
An Interactive Artwork Exploring the Influence of AI in Medical Diagnostics. Join the exhibition opening and panel discussion on “Transformative Spaces: Science-Art Residencies” on Friday, April 5, 2024, 18:00-20:00, Informatics Forum and Inspace Gallery as part of the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival
Presenting a programme of exhibitions and events featuring Design Informatics Master students and Creator in Residence exploring AI, technology, data and ethics.
An Interactive Artwork Exploring the Influence of AI in Medical Diagnostics
Exhibition Opening: “The BOX” with Panel Discussion on “Transformative Spaces: Science-Art Residencies” on Friday, April 5, 2024, 18:00-20:00, Informatics Forum and Inspace Gallery as part of the Edinburgh Science Festival
The potential benefits of using AI technology in healthcare are enormous. However, there are significant practical, technological, and legal implications that must be considered to protect patients. The BOX is an interactive installation that explores the “black box” aspect of AI technology, posing the question: If we feed AI with incomplete or biased data – can we then expect it to make reasonable suggestions?
In November, Scottish artist, scientist, and physician Fiona Smith visited Fraunhofer MEVIS in Bremen to develop an interactive art installation as part of the “STEAM Imaging V” residency program. With the theme “Holding the ‘Digital’ in Medicine to Account,” participants aim to look beyond the promises of new technological developments and data-driven tools. The goal is also to help prospective students gain a critical understanding of AI-driven applications in the healthcare sector, which increasingly permeates the interaction of all participants in the development process.
The BOX is now finished and can be experienced from 5 April to 19 April at the Inspace Gallery as part of the renowned Edinburgh Science Festival. The artwork invites the public to slip into the role of a patient and experience the reaction of an AI to medical data at first hand. In an interactive and playful way, Fiona Smith sheds light on essential questions raised by the use of artificial intelligence in medical diagnostics.
AI algorithms are now found in many areas of everyday life, including medicine, where they gradually make their way: AI programs recognize patterns in X-ray images that indicate diseases or support the search for active substance candidates for new drugs. However, numerous legal and ethical questions arise, especially in healthcare: What does an AI do with medical data, i.e., sensitive information about a person? How do we prevent an algorithm being trained one-sidedly, so that it does not produce biased and discriminatory results, leading to problematic therapy decisions? And how can it be ensured that both professionals and laypeople can understand how an AI comes to its decisions?
Smith dedicated herself to these aspects as part of the “STEAM Imaging V” residency program. The young Scot, who is doing her PhD at the University of Edinburgh on an AI topic, is also active as a doctor and artist. She applied with the idea for an interactive installation named The BOX, where the audience can feed data to an AI and then observe how the machine reacts.
In November 2023, Smith spent two weeks at Fraunhofer MEVIS in Bremen to exchange ideas with the MEVIS experts: “It was an interesting mix of mathematics, physics, art, philosophy, medicine, and software development,” she enthuses. “We had remarkable working conversations that continued over lunch.” Among other things, the participants reflected on how artistic means can convey that when an algorithm has to make a decision, there can indeed be uncertainties. These decision boundaries can subtly change, and even tip into the arbitrary, even though the AI might appear confident.
An integral part of the residency program is a STEAM workshop for students in Bremen and Edinburgh, which the artists conduct together with the MEVIS experts. “The two days in Bremen were intense, but fantastic,” the artist says. “The young people quickly picked up our thoughts about the regulation and ethics of artificial intelligence.” Among other things, participants were able to slip into the role of an AI to diagnose skin cancer. This role-play promoted understanding of how important representative datasets are for training AI. It also became clear that models show weaknesses if later test data deviates too much from the training data – the software cannot predict things it has never seen before. “The discussions with the young people helped me to refine the concept for my installation,” says Smith. “It became clear to me that AI models have a somewhat mythical presence among young people, yet they recoil at the idea of being treated by an AI themselves.”
Back in Edinburgh, Fiona Smith updated her concept and discussed and developed the design with Fraunhofer MEVIS, Inspace production team and specialist technicians across the Institute for Design Informatics and the University of Edinburgh. “It got pretty big pretty quickly,” Smith emphasizes. “In the end, a combination of several interactive sculptures came out, including an elaborate lighting design.”
And what can people expect at the Inspace Gallery? “The BOX invites people to enter a kind of futuristic clinic for hand surgery,” describes Smith. “They can slip into the role of patients undergoing an unusual examination.” Their hands are scanned, and the system spits out a coded test result. Subsequently, people find themselves as a kind of data point in the box, where an AI algorithm makes a decision about the treatment.
“By doing this, I want to tear down the barriers of the black box and convey how complex the algorithms and the mathematics behind them are,” explains Fiona Smith. It is important, for example, that an AI can only provide useful results if it has been fed with high-quality data beforehand. For Smith, these training data should represent the parts of the population for which the model is intended. And they should be collected in a fair and ethical manner and in compliance with legal regulations. “My hope is that my installation raises questions among people and makes them think critically when they hear something about AI models and their regulation,” says Smith – and laughs: “But of course, people should also have fun when they engage with The BOX.”
STEAM Imaging V is a creator residency of the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Medicine MEVIS in Bremen, Germany, in collaboration with the International Fraunhofer Talent School Bremen, the Schulzentrum Walle in Bremen, and the Institute for Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh in the UK. It is supported by Ars Electronica in Linz, Austria.
We are delighted to announce that for the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival Inspace Gallery will present two exhibitions and an associated events at Inspace.
Designing Data Humans
10am-5pm daily, 30-31 Mar 2024
Designing Data Humans exhibition features the work of Design Informatics MSc/MA students presenting a series of playful prototypes which examine and question our relationships to data technologies. View the works on display that try to help us to understand what it means to be human in a digital world and explore ideas addressing sustainable practices at the intersection of data and design, culture and society.
The BOXinteractive installation by Dr Fiona Smith, Creator in Residence at Fraunhofer MEVIS, explores the practical and ethical implications of integrating AI technology into healthcare accompanied by events that open up the creative process. Come explore the ‘black box’ aspect of AI technology in the context of digital medicine and journey into the internal and invisible workings of AI systems through the artwork and the associated events.
Learn how artists, scientists, and school students created an innovative science engagement space to explore the promises and challenges of AI in future healthcare.
Join us for the Panel Discussion on “Transformative Spaces: Science-Art Residencies” followed by the Exhibition Opening of “The BOX” on 18:00-20:00 Friday, 5 April, as part of the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival.
*See Venue Update
About the Panel
This panel will take place at Informatics Forum (please note venue change) and brings together Fiona Smith (Creator-in-residence), Matthias Günther and Bianka Hofmann (Fraunhofer MEVIS) and Caterina Mouruzzi and Nicola Osborne (Institute for Design Informatics, University of Edinburgh), to give insights into the “STEAM Imaging V” residency. Join this event to learn how artists, scientists, and school students created an innovative science engagement space to explore the promises and challenges of AI in future healthcare.
Exhibition Opening
This panel will be followed by a drinks reception in Inspace Gallery, opening the exhibition, ‘The BOX’ where audiences will be able to experience the interactive installation, as part of the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival.
Dr Fiona Smith is a doctor and an AI scientist whose passion for art has led her to exploring multimedia approaches for public engagement throughout her career.
Fiona is a graduate of the University of St Andrews and the University of Manchester Medical Schools. She completed her foundation training in South East Scotland and her Plastic Surgery Themed Core Surgical Training in North East England. In 2021 she joined the CDT for Biomedical AI at the University of Edinburgh, where in addition to investigating AI applications in surgery for her PhD, she is a tutor for Case Studies in AI Ethics.
Matthias Günther studied Physics at the University of Heidelberg and did his Ph.D. at the Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg on sophisticated Magnet Resonance Imaging development and applications. After receiving his Ph.D., he joined Advanced MRI Technology, a company founded by David Feinberg in California. After three and a half years, Dr. Günther came back to Germany to found his own company in Heidelberg, mediri GmbH, offering (research) services for image-based clinical trials. He also continued his scientific career at the university hospital Mannheim. After Habilitation in 2008, he became Professor at the University Bremen and joined Fraunhofer MEVIS in Bremen as part of the management board. He is now deputy institute director of Fraunhofer MEVIS with a joint professorship on MR-Physics
Bianka Hofmann is a producer and developer of contemporary formats to inspire experiences with new technologies, incorporating spaces for artistic practice and reflection in the humanities. Through this approach, she wants to enable a diverse audience to build an emotional and positive relationship with science and technology while avoiding uncritical optimism. Hofmann initiates, produces, and directs intersectional projects leveraging deep scientific knowledge within programs, productions, services, and workshops across science, integrating art. Specialized in the transdisciplinary transfer of knowledge through interactive experiences, she has delivered interactive exhibits and immersive experiences encompassing 2D-large-scale and 3D short films. Hofmann leads an international artist residency program at a research institution, including participatory STEAM courses to stimulate critical dialog about and widen the ownership of new technologies. She works presently as Head of Science Communication at Fraunhofer MEVIS.
Caterina Moruzzi is a Chancellor’s Fellow in the Institute for Design Informatics, School of Design and research affiliate of the Edinburgh’s Futures Institute at the University of Edinburgh. Her research lies at the intersection between the philosophy of art, history and philosophy of human and artificial creativity, and the philosophy of AI. She holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Nottingham and an artist diploma in piano performance from the Conservatorio G.B.Martini, Bologna, Italy. In her ongoing projects, she collaborates with researchers, artists, and technology companies to investigate modes of shared agency and creativity between humans, data, and technology.
Panel Chair
Nicola Osborne (they/them/she/her) is Manager of the Institute for Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh, EDI and Industry Partnerships Lead for the new UKRI AI Centre for Doctoral Training for Responsible and Trustworthy in-the-world NLP, and a co-investigator of the AHRC-funded CoSTAR Real-Time Lab. Nicola also manages Creative Informatics, supporting creative people to do innovative things with data. They also work on the EU-funded EKIP: Cultural and Creative Industries Policy Engine project, looking at how policy interventions can support creative innovation across Europe. Nicola is co-editor of forthcoming book: Data Driven Innovation in the Creative Industries (Routledge, April 2024).
An Interactive Artwork Exploring the Influence of AI in Medical Diagnostics. Join the exhibition opening and panel discussion on “Transformative Spaces: Science-Art Residencies” on Friday, April 5, 2024, 18:00-20:00, Informatics Forum and Inspace Gallery as part of the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival
Presenting a programme of exhibitions and events featuring Design Informatics Master students and Creator in Residence exploring AI, technology, data and ethics.
Join us in Inspace for an artist talk given by Angela Woodhouse and Caroline Broadhead with guest talk by Nicole Fernandez.
Join us in Inspace for Who Cares opening event, exhibition talks and panel discussion. This event features an artist talk given by Angela Woodhouse and Caroline Broadhead with guest talk by Nicole Fernandez who will present her project ‘Images of Care’. This will be followed by a panel discussion chaired by Dr. Susan Lechelt, who’s research is concerned with understanding and augmenting people’s perceptions and uses of data-driven technologies.
Event details
Tues, 5 Dec 2023 18:00-20:00 Free | Booking required Inspace
Artist Caroline Broadhead and Dancemaker Angela Woodhouse will share the creative process in the making of Who Cares, their video installation at Inspace, that explores the aesthetics of thermal imaging within the wider theme of care and contagion. They will discuss the initiation of the project through interviews with ICU nurses at Whittington Hospital, London and how their voices and experiences prompted the development of material in the studio. The artists will share footage and images from the research phase to illustrate themes such as touch, heat trace, intimacy, care, and ethics. The aim of the project is to acknowledge recent events, specifically the difficult and often traumatic experiences for carers, to question how do we care for the carers, and this in the context of the need to make an aesthetic object. The materiality of thermal imaging also draws upon the expanded body as data, drawing attention to readings of the body through biology.
About Images of Care
The Images of Care research project is part of the Advanced Care Research Centre (ACRC), a multi-disciplinary research programme at the University of Edinburgh. The aim of the Images of Care project is to gain a deeper understanding of care in later life through examining visual representations of care. The research consisted of both a detailed analysis of images of care in the news media during COVID-19 alongside understanding how individuals themselves visually communicate their experiences of care. It is crucial to examine how care in later life is visually represented, as these visual representations shape societal norms and perceptions surrounding aging and care.
Speakers
Caroline Broadhead
Caroline Broadhead’s interdisciplinary practice explores objects that come into contact with and interact with the body. Her work is exhibited internationally and represented in many international collections, including V&A, Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Museum of Art and Design, New York and Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. Her 2017 retrospective exhibition was shown in the Netherlands and the UK. She is Professor Emerita at Central Saint Martins, London.
Dance artist Angela Woodhouse’s work is essentially interdisciplinary and collaborative and has been shown widely over the last 30 years, most recently (Un)touched (2016-2020) and (de)figured (2017) in collaboration with artist Nathaniel Rackowe, exhibited in Belgrade, Oslo and Dubai respectively. Their latest work Expanded Landscapes was commissioned as part of Summer Lights Festival, Canary Wharf in 2022. In 2018 Angela was Artist in Residence at Siobhan Davies Studios as part of the MA/ MFA Creative Practice. She is currently senior lecturer in Dance at Middlesex University.
Susan Lechelt is a lecturer in Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh, working across interaction design and human-computer interaction. One key focus of her research is exploring emerging links between creative practice and contemporary technologies. As part of the Creative Informatics programme, she worked with a range of creative practitioners (e.g., visual and performing artists) to support them in considering how to use technologies ranging from Internet of Things to Artificial Intelligence in their work and practice. Her research also navigates questions of care, primarily in the context of using care as a lens to support more sustainable relationships between people and the technologies we own
Dr Nichole Fernández
Dr Nichole Fernández is a visual sociologist specialising in media studies, currently working as a Research Fellow on the Images of Care project at the Advanced Care Research Centre (University of Edinburgh). Within the ACRC, Nichole is exploring the how care later in life is visually represented and constructed. With a background in creative and visual methodologies, her expertise extends across diverse subjects, including digital sociology, mental health, migration, geography, nationalism, and environment. Before joining the ACRC, Nichole held positions as a Lecturer in Sociology at UCSD and an assistant professor at Hiram. Her PhD was conducted at the University of Edinburgh in sociology researching representations of nation and place.
Touch reveals the boundaries between us but it also connects us, enabling us to transcend our physical limits. Working with dance and thermal imagery to explore our sense of touch, their moving image work generated from heat data reveals new insights into the expanded body, asking questions about the role of care in society. Exhibition…
Interactive SciArt Installation by Fiona Smith (UK)
If we feed the AI with incomplete or biased data – can we expect it to come up with reasonable predictions?
‘The BOX’, is an interactive installation by Dr Fiona Smith, Creator in Residence at Fraunhofer MEVIS, presented by the Institute for Design Informatics, exploring the practical and ethical implications of integrating AI technology into healthcare.
The potential benefits of utilising AI technology in healthcare are vast but there are important practical, technological, ethical and legal implications that need to be addressed in order to safeguard patients. The BOX is an interactive installation that explores the ‘black box’ aspect of AI technology and asks “If we feed the AI with incomplete or biased data – can we expect it to suggest reasonable treatment plans?”.
Visitors to The BOX installation will be taken on an interactive journey through an alternative hospital clinic. Acting as patients, they will be scanned and then presented with their test results to The BOX. Through a dynamic light display, The BOX will then communicate the treatment plan it has decided for each patient. Once processed, the visitors will be given the opportunity to interrogate the knowledge base used by The BOX to make its decision.
Background
The STEAM Imaging V creator residency brought together the artist Fiona Smith, scientists at Fraunhofer MEVIS, and students from the International Fraunhofer Talent School Bremen and the Walle School Center to discuss the important ethical, legal and practical implications of implementing AI technology in healthcare. Building AI models that make accurate predictions for patients requires diverse training data sets that are representative of the test population. In some cases it might be possible to continuously update the model with new training data as it becomes available, but how do you regulate a model where performance is continuously changing? How do you detect when the accuracy of the predictions being made by a deployed model is changing or showing differential performance across different patient groups? These questions and more are explored with The BOX, which has been produced in collaboration with the Institute for Design Informatics, Edinburgh, and premieres at the Inspace Gallery as part of the 2024 Edinburgh Science Festival.
The BOX is the artistic outcome of the Creator in Residence Programme ’STEAM Imaging V Holding the ‘Digital’ in Medicine to Account’, hosted by Fraunhofer MEVIS, Bremen, Germany, in collaboration with the Institute for Design Informatics, Edinburgh, the International Fraunhofer Talent School Bremen, and the School Center Walle, Bremen, Germany, supported by Ars Electronica, Linz, Austria.
This event is part of this year’s Edinburgh Science Festival exploring the theme Shaping the Future, showcasing some of the cutting-edge science that can help us create a future that is sustainable, accessible and equal for all.
Exhibition details
6-19 Apr 2024 10am-5pm daily Inspace gallery
Creator in Residence
Dr Fiona Smith is a doctor and an AI scientist whose passion for art has led her to exploring multimedia approaches for public engagement throughout her career.
Fiona is a graduate of the University of St Andrews and the University of Manchester Medical Schools. She completed her foundation training in South East Scotland and her Plastic Surgery Themed Core Surgical Training in North East England. In 2021 she joined the CDT for Biomedical AI at the University of Edinburgh, where in addition to investigating AI applications in surgery for her PhD, she is a tutor for Case Studies in AI Ethics.
Programme Partners
Fraunhofer MEVIS develops real-world software solutions for image-and-data-supported early detection, diagnosis, and therapies for severe diseases and is embedded in a worldwide network of clinical and academic partners. The Institute’s scientists are committed to raising awareness about how digital medicine and related STEM sciences influence healthcare, and develop experiential projects at the intersection of science, art, and technology to reach new and diverse audiences, stimulate critical dialog between, and foster a more diverse R&D landscape.
Associated Event
Transformative Spaces: Science-Art Residencies
This panel event brings together those involved in the “STEAM Imaging V” residency, to give give insights into the process
This interactive exhibition features the work of students from the MSc and MA Design Informatics course at the University of Edinburgh. Students have created a series of playful prototypes which examine and question our relationships to data technologies and consider how we can use data as a tool for design. The works on display help us to understand what it means to be human in a digital world and explore ideas addressing sustainable practices at the intersection of data and design, culture and society.
Exhibition details
30-31 Mar 2024 10am-5pm daily Inspace gallery
MA/MSc Programmes
Design Informatics MA and MSc programmes focus on providing foundational skills on the integration of design thinking and data science with an emphasis on exploring the role of data-driven technologies in society and the potential of such technologies to be a social good. Students are supported to develop an ethically aware, critically reflective technical practice at the interface between data and society by combining theory and research with an open-ended process of making and hacking.
Presenting a programme of exhibitions and events featuring Design Informatics Master students and Creator in Residence exploring AI, technology, data and ethics.
OPEN 9-19 APRIL Design with Data is a design course taught at the University of Edinburgh as part of the Design Informatics Postgraduate programme and aims to investigate creative and novel ways to engage with data, its cultural contexts, conceptual framing and socio-cultural understanding. This year, in collaboration with Edinburgh Science Festival, our MA, MSc, MFA…
