Why, Mission Meta Pleb?
Meta Pleb was born out of a McMaster University USRA experiential learning research award I received in 2018. The research studied how to artistically visualize pollution data. The point of the project was to effectively display the data in a way that would invite curiosity, inform and delight in the viewer. The displays were designed so that flâneur or pedestrian could easily recognize the severity of the pollution where ever the visualizes were located. The mission of Meta Pleb pollution visualization projects is to inform and educate the public without alarming them.
The Meta Pleb site is has been converted from its original state as a research project to the public forum, designed to make the viewer reflect on how common sense and entitlement play a role in our perceptions of each other and the commons. This site is a venue to contemplate and discuss how our use of how politics, technology, art and the media affects the way we perceive our shared public sphere.