Catarina is a PhD candidate in Communication Design at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon (FBAUL).

Her PhD research explores data visualization techniques for the representation of personal identity, highlighting the potential of using personal data as a raw material for portraiture. The research is motivated by the current context of technological ubiquity, wherein virtually all human activities inevitably leave a digital trace and points to a reconceptualization of portraiture driven by computational media.

Catarina has been presenting the developments of her work at several international academic conferences and exhibitions since 2018.

She received her M.A. in Communication Design and New Media in 2019 (FBAUL) and graduated in Graphic Design and Multimedia Technologies in 2005 (ESAD.CR). Currently, she is a member of CIEBA (Center for Research and Studies in Fine Arts) and works as a graphic designer and art director.
   
Contact hello@catarinasampaio.com.
CiênciaVitae | ORCID


This page is exclusively dedicated to her academic research. For professional work please visit the portfolio here.

Projects _


The Self as Data (2021 — ongoing)
To what extent can data visualization fulfill the reflexive, documental, and biographical functions that are inherent to portraiture? ‘The Self as Data’ is a data visualization system that aims to fullfil the same expressive and communicational functions of a portrait. Drawing on the notion that “new media offer new opportunities for self-definition” (Bolter and Grusin 2000, 231) this project explores how the visualization of personal data can efficiently convey characteristics of one’s identity. In doing so, it also seeks to highlight the wider uses and implications of the mediation of identity by technologies of everyday use.
More information soon...


Data Self-Portrait (2018 — 2020)
‘Data Self-Portrait’ aims to explore the creative possibilities associated with the concept of data portrait and its potential for expressing personal identity. It consists of an installation that explores the visualization of personal data pertaining to the subject's daily activities, automatically captured by digital technologies of everyday use. The project is the result of an ongoing research that seeks to frame these visualizations as representations of personal identity that reflect one’s behavioral patterns as tools for self-analysis via self-tracking.
View video of the project︎
View project︎


Data Human Portraits (2018)
Nowadays, in a more or less conscious manner, we produce, share, use, and archive immense amounts of data, through web applications and tools embedded in the mobile devices we use on a daily basis. The data we produce are often accessible to Big Data companies that, according to a commercial perspective, aim at establishing consumer profiles. Considering that this kind of approach fails to capture our sensitivity and humanity, ‘Data Human Portraits’ is defined as an autoethnographic project that resorts to the collection and visualization of personal data as a means of self-observation.

View project ︎


Publications _


Data Visualization as Portraiture: An analysis of the use of personal data in the visual representation of identity (2022) Proceedings of xCoAx 2022: 10th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
ISBN: 978-989-9049-33-8
Proceedings (pp. 203-223) | Conference

Representing the Self Through the Visualization of Personal Data (2021) In International Journal of Creative Interfaces and Computer Graphics (IJCICG) 12(1)
DOI: 10.4018/IJCICG.2021010101
IJCICG Journal | PDF (protected)

On Data Portraits: An analysis of creative approaches to the visualization of personal data (2020) Proceedings of EVA London: 30th International Electronic Visualization and the Arts Conference
DOI: 10.14236/ewic/EVA2020.46
ScienceOpen | PDF | Conference


The Self as Data: Visualizing identity through data portraits (2020)
Proceedings of xCoAx 2020: 8th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
ISBN: 978-989-746-266-5
Proceedings (pp. 471-476) | Conference


Data Self-Portrait III (2020)
Proceedings of xCoAx 2020: 8th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
ISBN: 978-989-746-266-5
Video Proceedings (pp. 371-374) | Conference

 
Data Portraits as Tools of Self-reflection and Awareness (2019)
Proceedings of S&S 2019: 10th UNIDCOM/IADE International Conference Senses & Sensibility
ISBN: 978-989-54829-3-1

Proceedings (pp. 502-511) | Conference


Data Self-Portrait II (2019)
Proceedings of ARTECH 2019: 9th International Conference on Digital and Interactive Arts (ACM Association for Computing Machinery)
DOI: 10.1145/3359852.3359963 ACM Library | PDF | Conference


Data (Self) Portraits: An approach to the visualization of personal data from an autoethnographic perspective (2019)
Proceedings of xCoAx 2019: 7th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & XISBN: 978-989-746-220-7

Proceedings (pp. 109-124)
| Conference

Do Retrato ao Data Portrait: Visualização de dados pessoais e a reconceptualização do retrato (2019)
Proceedings of #18.ART: International Meeting of Art and Technology
ISSN: 2238-0272
Proceedings (pp. 32-47) | Conference
 

Data Self-Portrait: Visualização de dados pessoais segundo uma perspectiva auto-etnográfica (2019)
Proceedings of EnIAD: Encontro de Investigação em Arte e Design
(Accepted for publication)
PDF | Conference


Data Self-Portrait: Visualização de Dados Pessoais Segundo uma Perspectiva Auto-etnográfica (2019)
Master thesis
Read thesis



Oral presentations _


Data Visualization as Portraiture: An analysis of the use of personal data in the visual representation of identity
To be presented at xCoAx 2022: 10th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
July 2022, Coimbra, Portugal  
More info ︎

On Data Portraits: An analysis of creative approaches to the visualization of personal data
Presented at EVA London: 30th International Electronic Visualization and the Arts Conference
November 2020, London, UK  
More info ︎


The Self as Data: Visualizing identity through data portraits
Presented at xCoAx 2020: 8th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
July 2020, [Graz, Austria] Online 

More info ︎

Data Portraits as Tools of Self-reflection and Awareness
Presented at S&S 2019: 10th UNIDCOM/IADE International Conference Senses & Sensibility
November 2019, Lisbon, Portugal
More info ︎


Data Self-Portrait II
Presented at ARTECH 2019: 9th International Conference on Digital and Interactive Arts
October 2019, Braga, Portugal
More info ︎


Do Retrato ao Data Portrait: Visualização de dados pessoais e a reconceptualização do retrato
Presented at #18.ART International Meeting of Art and Technology
October 2019, Lisbon, Portugal
More info ︎


Data Self-Portrait: Visualização de dados pessoais segundo uma perspectiva auto-etnográfica
Presented at EnIAD: Encontro de Investigação em Arte e Design
October 2019, Lisbon, Portugal
More info ︎


Data (Self) Portraits: An approach to the visualization of personal data from an autoethnographic perspective
Presented at xCoAx 2019: 7th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & XJuly 2019, Milan, Italy

More info ︎


Data (self) Portrait: Utilização de processing na implementação de data portraits
Presented at Processing Community Day Lisbon Organized by the Escola Superior de Arte e Design das Caldas da Rainha
January 2019, Lisbon, Portugal
More info ︎


Data Portraits: Dados enquanto matéria artística
Presented at Congresso Internacional Retrato: Representações e Modos de SerOrganized by Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea - Museu do Chiado (MNAC), Instituto de História da Arte da Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa (IHA-FCSH/NOVA), Faculdade de Belas-Artes da Universidade de Lisboa (FBAUL), Centro de Estudos Humanísticos da Universidade do Minho (CEHUM) and Amigos do Museu do Chiado
November 2018, Lisbon, Portugal

More info ︎



Exhibitions _


Data Self-Portrait IV
Collective exhibition at Arroz Estúdios
Arroz Estúdios, Lisbon, Portugal
November 2021
More info ︎


Data Self-Portrait III
Collective exhibition at xCoAx 2020: 8th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X
[Palais Trauttmansdorff, Graz, Austria] Online
July 2020
More info & video ︎


Data Self-Portrait II
Collective exhibition at ARTECH: 9th International Conference on Digital and Interactive Arts
Altice Forum, Braga, Portugal 
October 2019

More info ︎


Data Self-Portrait I 
Collective exhibition at Processing Community Day Madrid
Medialab Prado, Madrid, Spain
January 2019

More info ︎


Data Self-Portrait I
Collective exhibition at Temp Studio #3 Open Day
Espaço TODOS, Lisbon, Portugal
November 2018

More info ︎


Data Human Portraits 
Collective exhibition The Data, the Web, the App
Fabrica Features, Lisbon, Portugal
June 2018

More info ︎



Residencies _


Temp Studio #3
Lisbon, Portugal
November 2018

More info ︎


Mark




Arcana Mundi — Economy and Eccentricity



“Profuse strains of unpremeditated art.”
(Shelley)
                A rock is a perfect metaphor, an allegory in volume. When placed it’s sculptural limits beget a kind of artistic proposition — and when considered with reduced anthropomorphism and ungeologically — produce a ready-made analog to the causation and bounds of our attempts at the understanding of all things.

Here the sculptor has made no concessions; no attempts to curry favor with curators or collectors — pieces wholly outside discourse. And if pressed for an affiliate movement for these “sculptures” (i.e. Cubism, Mannerism, etc.)… perhaps Monism or Cosmogonism? Definitely not Conceptualism or Pataphysics — Actualism?

The analog? Well for sure it is 1:1. Weird; yes — a knot to be admired for it’s curves — not for untying. An emergent surface as thick as it’s mass. 
 
Were it possible for the instances of our minds or world events to be mapped and dimensionally materialized, something similar to a rock would appear — areas of smoothness yielding to pockmarked particularities, density shifts and feathered explosions. What really is the shape of a boom town? A pilgrim’s journey? A section of jungle mayhem? A boring era? The silhouette of a father’s cold slap? The contours of a brief, intense friendship? Comfortably we perceive all of these things as ready to be integrated into ledgers or novels or timelines; but really they are queer crags and striations of unimaginable idiosyncrasy.

So yes, the reflective, reasonable yield of our mind has much symmetry (computation, cataloguing, narrativizing, etc.) but it’s actual shape is no shape, but unfolding chaos and singularity visible only to our particular time-scale. Our species-wide symmetries and quantizations are basically improvisations white-labeled onto directionless infinitude attempting the constant creation of navigable Dimension.

So, look intimately at a rock, walk around it, get up close to it, savor it’s complexion and composition as you would any painting or temple and see it as the faultless mirror that it is — a truly perfect sculpture.



ABSTRACTION AND EMPIRICAL ILLUSTRATION
We live our lives made up of a great quantity of isolated instants. So as to be lost at the heart of a multitude of things. (From the Double Dream of Spring, 1970.)




  1. Gavrilo Princip’s last grocery list written
  2. The time that alligator ate that fish
  3. When the Yongzheng Emperor found that weird dust bunny under his throne
  4. The great earthquake of Alexandria
  1. The invention of expectation in literature
  2. When the heaviest cacao fruit fell in Takalik Abaj
  3. Animesh eats his first Fly Agaric mushroom