Taoist Data Visualization: An Embodied Aesthetic Approach to Data Visualization through Gesture-Based Technology

Abstract

The study of data visualization from an aesthetic perspective has become an emerging area that focuses on user experience rather than exclusively on the communication of information. It has the potential to enhance emotional engagement in the perception of visual images, while facilitating users’ ability to decode meaning. This discourse is primarily based on Western aesthetic concepts. This paper argues that traditional Chinese aesthetics and Taoist body philosophy have the potential to benefit the aesthetic dimension of data visualization. The aim of this paper is to explore the possibility of a new embodied aesthetic of data visualization that applies Taoist body principles to gesture-based technology. This new concept of Taoist data visualization emphasizes how traditional Chinese aesthetics could be explored and examined in the contemporary digital technological context. It involves the development of the notion of the “Taoist digital body”, where the unification of the human body and digital technology creates the experience of harmony, immersion, and imagination between subjects (users) and objects (data). This paper presents an example of Taoist data visualization using sleep EEG data as sample data visualized through gesture-based technology, specifically the Microsoft Kinect platform. The gesture-based technology makes it possible to integrate traditional Chinese aesthetics with contemporary technology. This paper explores the transformational relationship between the human body and technology, particularly in creating a new embodied aesthetic combining Taoist body philosophy and digital technology.