Abstract:

This communication intends to describe a development process of an online research platform in which the visualization of spatiotemporal data was worked on in the CREAT_ED project. The project aims to historicize the fabrication of the creative child from a critical postcolonial lens. In this sense, during the development of the online platform, some problems were encountered at a technical level and at the level of representation. This communication intends to focus on these problems, on the ways found to solve them, and to outline future possibilities for the tool, giving, on the one hand, continuity to the CREAT_ED project and, on the other hand, outlining the possibility of a fork of the platform for other projects.

The platform was first developed to distribute and represent events as chronological data. On the one hand, the representation of a conventional timeline was problematic as a characteristic element of a linear and imperial history; on the other hand, the minimalist representation used basic geometric shapes, often called 'pure' or 'primitive,' highly problematic concepts from a postcolonial perspective. Visualizations were then developed to overcome these connotations, such as a histogram model and an exploded visualization in timeframes. In the second phase, we tried to geo-reference the data and find alternative forms of visualization. Once again, we are faced with the problem of representation via maps based on the Mercator projection, which carries Eurocentric colonial history. For this, a type of visualization was developed that reverses the orientation to south-north.

Even though we encountered several problems both at a technical level and in terms of representations, the fact is that the platform fulfilled its initial objectives of being a research tool for the CREAT_ED project. During the project's seminars open to other researchers, professors, and students, the issue of opening up the platform to use beyond the team itself began to arise, both at the back and front office levels. This discussion adds new problems to a work that already dealt with the care of showing or not showing information that contains different layers of violence. However, it also seeks to give visibility to resistance and teaching materials that deal with this problem.

The development methodology allowed, in a collaborative and participatory way, a decouped architecture with Drupal cms as a back office and using React as a front end. This architecture allows expanding the development in different directions, from a repository to a LMS. At this moment, it is intended to continue the CREAT_ED project and develop new forms of visualization. Simultaneously, it is intended to develop a fork of the platform with a thematic and technical abstraction to serve other projects and other audiences in arts education and community use.

This communication ends with the problematization of the future development of the platform with broader access to the repository, but also with questioning what can be shown, how it can be represented, and focused on open teaching materials in a user-centered perspective.

Keywords:

Arts education, archive, repository, teaching materials, access, postcolonial, user-centered, drupal, react, decoupled architecture.