TALK
CREATING PHYSICAL DATA EXPERIENCES.
Shirley Wu discusses an alternative to digital charts as the primary mode of data communication. She details her exploration and creation of physical data experiences as a way of interacting with data that invites more emotion, curiosity, and conversation. She challenges the assumption that data must be strictly functional, instead asserting that data should be acknowledged as a reflection of our humanity and the emotional relationships it represents. Through examples of her art, Shirley illustrates how data can be presented in a physical form that speaks to feelings, not figures.

BIO
Shirley Wu is a Chinese-American data visualisation designer, engineer, and artist. She uses her love of art, math, and code to develop colorful, compelling, highly interactive web-based visual narratives, as well as art installations about Asian and Asian-American experiences. Raised in the Philippines, China, Japan, and the United States, Wu draws inspiration from her unique transnational upbringing to investigate identity formation in contemporary Diasporic Asian culture. She has exhibited in solo and group shows in New York City, Tokyo, and the United Kingdom, and was a Human-in-Residence at NYU ITP. In addition, she has worked with Google, Sony Interactive Entertainment, The Guardian, Scientific American, SFMOMA, M+ Museum of Culture, and many others to produce internal and public education data visualisations. In 2021, she co-published "Data Sketches," an award-winning book on data visualisation.

TALK
SHAPING NEW PERSPECTIVES: EMBRACING UNCERTAINTY IN TIMES OF CONSTANT CHANGE.
In their talk, onformative shares how embracing uncertainty in the digital age can spark new ideas and drive creative innovation. The studio examines how emerging technologies are reshaping roles and challenging established norms.

The presentation explores how data and AI have evolved from basic tools to active collaborators, redefining the creative process. Drawing from their interdisciplinary expertise, onformative demonstrates how technology shapes creativity - recognizing both its enabling power and inherent limitations.

Through practical examples and forward-thinking approaches, the studio illustrates their leadership in this transformation. By fostering a dialogue of co-creation between human intuition and rapid technological advancement, onformative crafts engaging narratives that challenge conventional thinking. This opens new avenues for innovation, creating lasting impact at the intersection of art, design, and technology.

BIO
Cedric Kiefer, Co-Founder and Creative Lead of onformative, develops and directs projects to define the creative vision of the studio. Cedric's fascination with science, technology and art fuels the development of new projects at onformative. He is a regular speaker on digital art and AI at international conferences. He also serves as a lecturer for AI Innovation at mdh Berlin.

onformative is a creative innovation studio shaping new perspectives by combining art, design and technology. They believe design is about setting direction, not just adding superficial aesthetics. Their research-driven approach leads to intentional, impactful experiences that resonate on deeper levels. They craft human-centered concepts and visual narratives that offer compelling visions of the future.

TALK
NONBINARY EYES ON AI.
The presentation explores biases in AI-generated content through the queer feminist lens of nonbinarity - the turning of oppositional dichotomies into coexisting axes. By merging social identity theory with psychometrics, queer studies, and critical data science, the Gender Diamond changed the "women/men" binary into femininity and masculinity scales, coexisting in a gender spectrum. Similarly, the South Tyrolean Language Diamond transformed the "German/Italian" dichotomy into the nuanced dimensions of Germanicity and Italianity, thus defining a language spectrum. By examining how AI systems stereotype the mixed social groups mapped on these Diamonds, the presentation reveals underlying power asymmetries beyond the taken-for-granted binaries.

BIO
Fe Simeoni is an information designer from Treviso and PhD student in computer science at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, the Institute for Minority Rights and the Center for Autonomy Experience of Eurac Research. Their research applies visual design methods in the study of identity-based discrimination from a cyberqueer perspective. They have produced data visualisations for geopolitical divulgation (Sapienza University of Rome), scientific communication (Helsinki Design Week), education (Feltrinelli; Sanoma), and genetic research (University of Helsinki; Aalto University; the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT).

TALK
NAVIGATING THE WORLD OF TYPE.
One of the fields of design that is currently at a turning point is typography. Through the technological advancement of the last few years, and with the additions of AR and VR media, the creation of relevant typefaces has become a necessity – typefaces that don't focus solely on aesthetics, but are also multifunctional, scalable, and accessible. In response to this change of parameters, type has become a powerful tool and has opened up new possibilities in unexplored fields. Through the use of pre-existing type technologies and the introduction of variable fonts it is now possible to not only respond to the type's immediate context but to also anticipate its use. How we "consume" written content is ever-changing, and we need to ensure that type remains effective – now and in the future.

BIO
Eleni Beveratou is Creative Director at Dalton Maag. Eleni holds a BA and MA in Communication Design from Vakalo Art & Design College, and an MA in Typeface Design from the University of Reading. During her time at Dalton Maag, Eleni has been involved amongst others in the design of typefaces for Airbnb, Oracle, Aston Martin, and Facebook. Eleni has a particular interest in the science of reading, and its impact on type design. Her findings have been featured in Digital Fonts and Reading by World Scientific.

TALK
INTERACTIVE STORYTELLING OF COMPLEX SYSTEMS THROUGH METAPHOR.
Communicating complex systems to a broad audience is challenging - traditional scientific visuals often speak only to experts. This talk explores how metaphor and interactive storytelling can make intricate ideas intuitive and engaging. Liuhuaying will showcase several web-based projects where forests, webs, and flowers become narrative and visual tools, revealing how design choices shape understanding, interpretation, and curiosity.

BIO
Liuhuaying Yang is a data visualisation specialist and faculty member at the Complexity Science Hub in Vienna. She creates interactive visualisations that turn complex scientific research and societal data into engaging, accessible experiences. Her work has received first prize in the 2019 TRB Innovations in Transit Performance Measurement Challenge, first place in the interactive category of the 2023 World Dataviz Prize, two Gold awards in the 2024 Information is Beautiful Awards (Science, Technology & Health and Impressive Individual), and most recently the City of Vienna's Promotion Prize in STEM for making complex science accessible.

TALK
REFRAMING AFRICA.
My Africa is a data-led storytelling talk that challenges the single-story narratives often used to describe the African continent. Blending personal experience with data visualisation, cultural insight, and media critique, the talk explores how maps, metrics, and headlines can flatten complexity and how they can be re-designed to tell richer, more truthful stories. Delivered as a performative data essay, My Africa invites audiences to question how data frames perception, whose perspectives are prioritised, and what becomes possible when data is used not just to inform, but to humanise.

BIO
Obinna Iwuji is a creative developer, data designer, and storyteller working at the intersection of data visualisation, communication, and performance. With a background spanning advertising, global partnerships, and information design, his work explores how data can move beyond charts and reports to become something people feel, remember, and talk about. Through interactive experiences, live talks, and data-driven shows, Obinna focuses on communicating complexity in human ways using humour, narrative, and visual experimentation to help audiences rethink how data shapes what we believe about the world.

TALK
DESIGNING STORIES: VISUAL STORYTELLING IN THE NEWSROOM.
At Süddeutsche Zeitung, visual work is embedded from the very beginning of the storytelling process. Design is used as a method, a way of deciding how a story should be told, not just how it looks. This talk explores visual storytelling in a busy newsroom: from choosing the right format or medium for each story – whether it is data visualisation, illustration, scrollytelling, print or social – to strengthening collaboration across teams and building design systems that keep work consistent across stories and platforms while still allowing experimentation. Using specific SZ projects, this session shows how visual storytelling is used to make complex visual or data-driven stories compelling and engaging.

BIO
Lina Moreno is Art Director at Süddeutsche Zeitung, one of Germany's leading national newspapers. She works on both the visible and behind-the-scenes aspects of visual journalism. Beyond her editorial work, she leads strategic design projects inside the newsroom. Before joining SZ, she spent five years at the German magazine Der Spiegel, where she shaped the editorial design for digital platforms and art-directed several investigative stories. Originally from Colombia, she studied visual arts before earning a Master's in Design in Hamburg. She is particularly interested in translating complex stories into compelling visual concepts and works at the intersection of design, code, multimedia, and storytelling. She currently splits her time between Hamburg and Munich.

TALK
THE SQUARE IS BURNING AND THE MAP IS SHAKING.
Numbers, data, maps, and statistics speak with confidence. Too much confidence, at times. They present themselves as neutral and objective views of reality. They show one part of what is going on, but often leave out the most uncomfortable part. How life is lived, and how it feels. In a world full of neat charts and badly solved problems, this talk asks a political and design question. How do we create empathy and open awkward conversations in a tired world? The answer is not a final fix. It is a series of attempts and small rehearsals. Experiments with art, technology, and participation that remind us that design always takes a stand, even when the data says it does not need to.

BIO
Marta Handenawer is Creative Director and Self Andrea is Algorithmic Dissidence Expert at Domestic Data Streamers. DDS is a creative studio that turns data into public experiences. They work with numbers to talk about people, love, power, memory, and everyday life. Through installations, campaigns, and digital tools in streets, schools, prisons, museums, and institutions, they make data something you can feel, discuss, and question together. Their work treats data as a social material, never neutral, always shaped by choices, values, and blind spots.