spotlies

Spotlies shows how easily numbers and graphs can mislead us. A slight distortion, a clever omission, an innocent misinterpretation — and suddenly, a graph tells a completely different story. This work warns of the power and danger of statistical visualisations: they can clarify facts but also mislead, manipulate, and distort our perception of truth.

Data are essential information to objectivise situations, communicate scientific facts, support our opinions and guide our decisions. Numbers do not lie. But the ways they are collected, represented and interpreted introduce an element of subjectivity that can distort the reality of the facts, alter our reasoning and mislead our judgement.

Through a series of three recognisable situations, reminiscent of animation films sets, short stories come to life thanks to a layer of micro-projections animating the scenes.

These scenarios tell short stories we all know: the evening news, a politician’s speech, a YouTube-video’s content. They all support their arguments with graphic representations that can deceive their audience. An outside character then comments on the scenes to point out errors in data visualisation and share some tips on how to spot the lies.

In a post-pandemic world, data, infographics and numbers have entered our daily lives. Faced with this information overload, how can we all develop mental tools to sharpen our critical thinking skills?