Insightful human portraits made from data | R. Luke DuBois

翻译人员: Jinyu Wang 校对人员: Lydia Yu

So I'm an artist,

我是一个艺术家

but a little bit of a peculiar one.

但有点不同

I don't paint.

我不会油画

I can't draw.

我也不会速写

My shop teacher in high school wrote that I was a menace

我的高中劳技老师曾在我的评语里写

on my report card.

我是一个捣蛋鬼

You probably don't really want to see my photographs.

你可能不会想看我的摄影

But there is one thing I know how to do:

但有一件事 我知道怎么做好

I know how to program a computer.

我会给计算机设计程序

I can code.

我会编码

And people will tell me that 100 years ago,

人们会告诉我 在一百年前

folks like me didn't exist,

不存在像我这样的人

that it was impossible,

我做的事情是不可能实现的

that art made with data is a new thing,

这种用字符创作的艺术是全新的

it's a product of our age,

是我们新时代的产物

it's something that's really important

作为一种最新的产物的代表

to think of as something that's very "now."

它也格外重要

And that's true.

这都没错

But there is an art form that's been around for a very long time

但有一种存在了很久的艺术形式

that's really about using information,

也是利用信息

abstract information,

利用抽象的信息

to make emotionally resonant pieces.

产生情感上的共鸣

And it's called music.

它就是音乐

We've been making music for tens of thousands of years, right?

我们创作音乐已有上千年了 对吧

And if you think about what music is --

如果要说音乐是什么

notes and chords and keys and harmonies and melodies --

音乐就是音符 和弦 音调 和声和旋律

these things are algorithms.

这些东西就是算法

These things are systems

它们是设计好的系统

that are designed to unfold over time,

会随着时间的推移打开

to make us feel.

让我们能去感受

I came to the arts through music.

我是通过音乐接触艺术的

I was trained as a composer,

我曾被训练为作曲家

and about 15 years ago, I started making pieces

十五年前 我开始创作一些片段

that were designed to look at the intersection

希望能达到

between sound and image,

声音与图像的完美融合

to use an image to unveil a musical structure

用一幅画面去揭示一个音乐结构

or to use a sound to show you something interesting

或者用一个声音去展示有趣的事情

about something that's usually pictorial.

那些一般比较形象化的东西

So what you're seeing on the screen is literally being drawn

所以你在屏幕上看到的实际上都是

by the musical structure of the musicians onstage,

由舞台上的音乐家的乐曲结构构成的

and there's no accident that it looks like a plant,

它们不出意外的看起来像是植物

because the underlying algorithmic biology of the plant

因为它最初的乐曲结构本质上就是

is what informed the musical structure in the first place.

植物最基本的生物算法

So once you know how to do this, once you know how to code with media,

所以当你知道如何去编程时

you can do some pretty cool stuff.

你就可以做出很多有意思的东西

This is a project I did for the Sundance Film Festival.

这是我曾为圣丹斯电影节做过的一个项目

Really simple idea: you take every Academy Award Best Picture,

很简单的想法就是 收集所有奥斯卡得奖摄影

you speed it up to one minute each

然后把每一部加速播放到一分钟

and string them all together.

再把他们都串在一起

And so in 75 minutes, I can show you the history of Hollywood cinema.

所以我可以只用75分钟 来向你展示好莱坞电影史

And what it really shows you is the history of editing

而真正展示的是

in Hollywood cinema.

好莱坞电影的编辑史

So on the left, we've got Casablanca; on the right, we've got Chicago.

所以我们可以得到 左边的是卡萨布兰卡市 右边的是芝加哥

And you can see that Casablanca is a little easier to read.

你也可以发现卡萨布兰卡市看起来更容易

That's because the average length of a cinematic shot in the 1940s

那是因为在20世纪40年代

was 26 seconds,

电影镜头的平均长度为26秒

and now it's around six seconds.

而如今约为6秒

This is a project that was inspired

这个项目是受启发于

by some work that was funded by the US Federal Government

美国联邦政府在21世纪初

in the early 2000s,

赞助的一些工作

to look at video footage and find a specific actor in any video.

就是从任何片段录像镜头中 找出一个具体的人物

And so I repurposed this code to train a system on one person

我改写了程序来 训练这个系统

in our culture who would never need to be surveilled in that manner,

去识别一个在我们的文化中 永远不需要被这样监视的人物

which is Britney Spears.

她就是布兰妮·斯皮尔斯（Britney Spears）

I downloaded 2,000 paparazzi photos of Britney Spears

我下载了2000张狗仔队偷拍的布兰妮的照片

and trained my computer to find her face

训练我的电脑去识别她

and her face alone.

而且仅仅是她

I can run any footage of her through it and will center her eyes in the frame,

我可以播放任意她的片段 电脑会在相框内聚焦她的眼睛

and this sort of is a little double commentary

这个事情反映了

about surveillance in our society.

我们社会对于监控的一种矛盾心理

We are very fraught with anxiety about being watched,

我们因为被监视着而充满了焦虑

but then we obsess over celebrity.

却时刻对公众人物做着这样的事情

What you're seeing on the screen here is a collaboration I did

你现在在屏幕上看到的

with an artist named Lián Amaris.

是我和一名叫Lián Amaris的艺术家共同完成的

What she did is very simple to explain and describe,

她的任务说起来容易

but very hard to do.

做起来难

She took 72 minutes of activity,

她需要呈现的在是72分钟里

getting ready for a night out on the town,

为一次城里的狂欢夜梳妆打扮

and stretched it over three days

但要拉长到整整三天

and performed it on a traffic island in slow motion in New York City.

她需要在纽约街头的一个交通岛 用慢动作来展现这一切

I was there, too, with a film crew.

我也在那里 带着一个摄影团队

We filmed the whole thing,

我们录下了整个过程

and then we reversed the process, speeding it up to 72 minutes again,

然后把它倒放 再加速到72分钟

so it looks like she's moving normally

使她看起来是以正常速度移动

and the whole world is flying by.

整个世界却是在飞速的运转着

At a certain point, I figured out

有一次 我突然发觉

that what I was doing was making portraits.

我正在做的正是塑造画像

When you think about portraiture, you tend to think about stuff like this.

当提到肖像画时 你可能会想到这样的东西

The guy on the left is named Gilbert Stuart.

左边的这个人叫吉伯特·斯图尔特

He's sort of the first real portraitist of the United States.

他可能是美国第一位肖像画家

And on the right is his portrait of George Washington from 1796.

右边的就是他在1796年为乔治·华盛顿做的肖像

This is the so-called Lansdowne portrait.

这就是所谓的“兰丝唐呢绒”肖像

And if you look at this painting, there's a lot of symbolism, right?

如果你仔细看这幅画 会发现很多象征符号 对吗

We've got a rainbow out the window. We've got a sword.

这里有窗外的彩虹 这里有剑

We've got a quill on the desk.

这里有桌上的羽毛笔

All of these things are meant to evoke

所有这些事物都在暗示我们

George Washington as the father of the nation.

这是乔治·华盛顿——美国之父

This is my portrait of George Washington.

这个是我对乔治·华盛顿的肖像画

And this is an eye chart,

它像是一个视力测试表

only instead of letters, they're words.

只是它不是由字母组成 而是单词

And what the words are is the 66 words

这66个单词是

in George Washington's State of the Union addresses

乔治·华盛顿在国情咨文演说中

that he uses more than any other president.

比其他总统用的都要多的单词

So "gentlemen" has its own symbolism and its own rhetoric.

所以“先生们”这个词 有其独特的象征和修辞意义

And it's really kind of significant that that's the word he used the most.

作为他用得最频繁的词 这个词是有着某种重要意义的

This is the eye chart for George W. Bush,

这是乔治·布什的“视力表”

who was president when I made this piece.

当我做这张表的时候 他还不是总统

And how you get there,

从“先生们”到“恐怖行动”

from "gentlemen" to "terror" in 43 easy steps,

经历了43个简单的步骤 （43届总统）

tells us a lot about American history,

蕴藏着很多关于美国的历史

and gives you a different insight

相比于看一系列的画作

than you would have looking at a series of paintings.

可以使你获得别样的体验

These pieces provide a history lesson of the United States

这些作品通过领导人的政治辞令

through the political rhetoric of its leaders.

为我们展现了一节生动的美国历史课

Ronald Reagan spent a lot of time talking about deficits.

罗纳德·里根花了很多时间谈论财政赤字

Bill Clinton spent a lot of time

比尔·克林顿花了很多时间谈论

talking about the century in which he would no longer be president,

他不再是总统的21世纪

but maybe his wife would be.

她的夫人有可能成为总统的21世纪

Lyndon Johnson was the first President

林登·约翰逊是第一任

to give his State of the Union addresses on prime-time television;

在电视黄金时间发表国情咨文演说的总统

he began every paragraph with the word "tonight."

他每段都以“今晚”开头

And Richard Nixon, or more accurately, his speechwriter,

理查德·尼克松 更准确的说 他的撰稿人

a guy named William Safire,

一个叫威廉·萨菲尔的人

spent a lot of time thinking about language

花了很多时间斟酌他的言辞

and making sure that his boss portrayed a rhetoric of honesty.

以确保他的老板正在演说着“诚实”的辞令

This project is shown as a series of monolithic sculptures.

这个项目以一系列统一的雕塑来展现

It's an outdoor series of light boxes.

是一系列的户外灯箱

And it's important to note that they're to scale,

值得注意的是 它们和视力表一样是成比例的

so if you stand 20 feet back and you can read between those two black lines,

也就是说 如果你站在20尺外 能领会到这两行黑字的言外之意

you have 20/20 vision.

说明你视力正常

(Laughter)

（笑声）

This is a portrait. And there's a lot of these.

这是一种肖像画 类似的还有很多

There's a lot of ways to do this with data.

有很多种方法来利用这些数据

I started looking for a way

我开始寻找一种方法

to think about how I can do a more democratic form of portraiture,

用一种更大众的形式来表现

something that's more about my country and how it works.

更多的关于我的国家和它的运转方式

Every 10 years, we make a census in the United States.

美国每十年人口普查一次

We literally count people,

我们做的就是清点人数

find out who lives where, what kind of jobs we've got,

查清谁住在哪 我们都有什么工作

the language we speak at home.

我们在家都说什么语言

And this is important stuff -- really important stuff.

的确 这些都是非常重要的事

But it doesn't really tell us who we are.

但并不能描述出我们的真实身份

It doesn't tell us about our dreams and our aspirations.

这些不能描述我们的梦想 我们的和抱负

And so in 2010, I decided to make my own census.

因此 在2010年 我决定做我自己的人口普查

And I started looking for a corpus of data

我开始寻找那些

that had a lot of descriptions written by ordinary Americans.

由普通美国群众写的有大量描述性内容的数据库

And it turns out

结果我发现

that there is such a corpus of data

就有着这样的数据库

that's just sitting there for the taking.

等着我去利用起来

It's called online dating.

就是在线约会网站

So in 2010, I joined 21 different online dating services,

所以 2010年我注册了21个不同的在线约会网站

as a gay man, a straight man, a gay woman and a straight woman,

以各种不同的身份 包括同性恋男 直男 同性恋女 直女

in every zip code in America

还用美国各地的邮编

and downloaded about 19 million people's dating profiles --

下载了一千九百万人的档案

about 20 percent of the adult population of the United States.

也就是大约20%美国成人人口

I have obsessive-compulsive disorder.

我有强迫症

This is going to become really freaking obvious. Just go with me.

会越来越明显的 稍微忍忍吧

(Laughter)

（笑声）

So what I did was I sorted all this stuff by zip code.

所以我把所有资料按邮编分类

And I looked at word analysis.

用词汇分析法来分析

These are some dating profiles from 2010

这是一些2010年的档案中

with the word "lonely" highlighted.

包含“孤独”这个词的被我高亮的出来

If you look at these things topographically,

如果从地理的角度来看

if you imagine dark colors to light colors are more use of the word,

颜色越亮代表词语使用量越高

you can see that Appalachia is a pretty lonely place.

你可以发现阿巴拉契亚是一个十分孤独的地方

You can also see that Nebraska ain't that funny.

还可以看出内布拉斯加州也不是那么的有趣

This is the kinky map, so what this is showing you

这是一幅有些扭曲的地图

is that the women in Alaska need to get together

它告诉我们的是 阿拉斯加的女人需要和

with the men in southern New Mexico,

南方新墨西哥州的男人在一起

and have a good time.

过上幸福生活

And I have this at a pretty granular level,

我还可以告诉你一些更细微的发现

so I can tell you that the men in the eastern half of Long Island

从长岛东半边来的男人

are way more interested in being spanked

比西半边的

than men in the western half of Long Island.

更乐于被挨巴掌

This will be your one takeaway from this whole conference.

这可以作为你在这次活动的收获之一

You're going to remember that fact for, like, 30 years.

这个结论你应该可以记大概 30年吧

(Laughter)

（笑声）

When you bring this down to a cartographic level,

把这个想法应用到地图上

you can make maps and do the same trick I was doing with the eye charts.

同样可以实现 就像我做的“视力表”一样

You can replace the name of every city in the United States

你可以把美国每个城市的名字

with the word people use more in that city than anywhere else.

替换成每个地方的人们使用频率高的词语

If you've ever dated anyone from Seattle, this makes perfect sense.

如果你曾和来自西雅图的人约过会 你就会明白

You've got "pretty." You've got "heartbreak."

你会听到“好漂亮” 你会听到“心碎了”

You've got "gig." You've got "cigarette."

你会听到“现场演出“ 你会听到“香烟”

They play in a band and they smoke.

他们会有乐队的演出 他们也抽烟

And right above that you can see "email."

右上方你可以看到“电子邮件”

That's Redmond, Washington,

那是华盛顿州的雷蒙德市

which is the headquarters of the Microsoft Corporation.

正是微软总部的所在地

有些你都可以猜到 比如 洛杉矶是“表演”

Some of these you can guess -- so, Los Angeles is "acting"

and San Francisco is "gay."

旧金山是“同性恋”

Some are a little bit more heartbreaking.

有些是有点令人悲伤的

In Baton Rouge, they talk about being curvy;

在巴吞鲁日 人们谈论肥胖

downstream in New Orleans, they still talk about the flood.

到下游的新奥尔良市 人们仍在谈论洪水

Folks in the American capital will say they're interesting.

在美国首都的人们会说他们很有趣

People in Baltimore, Maryland, will say they're afraid.

在马里兰州巴尔的摩的人们则会说他们很害怕

This is New Jersey.

这是新泽西

I grew up somewhere between "annoying" and "cynical."

我在“烦人“和”愤世嫉俗“之间长大

(Laughter) (Applause)

（笑声）（掌声）

And New York City's number one word is "now,"

纽约市排名第一的词是“现在”

as in, "Now I'm working as a waiter, but actually I'm an actor."

比如 别看我现在是个服务生 实际上我是个演员

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Or, "Now I'm a professor of engineering at NYU, but actually I'm an artist."

或者 “我现在是个纽约大学的工程教授 但实际上我是个艺术家”

If you go upstate, you see "dinosaur."

往北一些 你会看到“恐龙”

That's Syracuse.

那是锡拉丘兹

The best place to eat in Syracuse, New York,

纽约州的锡拉丘兹里最好的用餐地点

is a Hell's Angels barbecue joint called Dinosaur Barbecue.

是一个叫恐龙烧烤的飞车党烧烤酒吧

That's where you would take somebody on a date.

那是一个可以约会的好地方

I live somewhere between "unconditional" and "midsummer," in Midtown Manhattan.

我住在一个在“无条件的”和“夏至“之间的地方 在曼哈顿中部

And this is gentrified North Brooklyn,

这是修缮后的北布鲁克林

so you've got "DJ" and "glamorous" and "hipsters" and "urbane."

所以你会看到“DJ” “迷人的” “嬉皮士”和“都市化的”

So that's maybe a more democratic portrait.

所以这应该是个更大众的肖像

And the idea was, what if we made red-state and blue-state maps

另一个想法就是 把这个应用到红蓝两党的地图上

based on what we want to do on a Friday night?

基于周五晚上我们想做什么

This is a self-portrait.

这将是一副自画像

This is based on my email,

基于我的电子邮箱

about 500,000 emails sent over 20 years.

有这20年里的大约五十万封邮件

You can think of this as a quantified selfie.

你可以把这个想象成一个定量的自拍照

So what I'm doing is running a physics equation

我做的就是在我的个人数据的基础上

based on my personal data.

套用一个物理公式

You have to imagine everybody I've ever corresponded with.

想象一下与我有过交集的每一个人

It started out in the middle and it exploded with a big bang.

从中心开始 在一声巨响后向四面八方炸裂

And everybody has gravity to one another,

而每个人之间互相都有引力

gravity based on how much they've been emailing,

引力大小取决于他们之间发送电子邮件的频率

who they've been emailing with.

以及他们给谁发过电子邮件

And it also does sentimental analysis,

这之中也包含了感性分析

so if I say "I love you," you're heavier to me.

例如我说“我爱你” 那么你对我的引力就越大

And you attract to my email addresses in the middle,

你就会被我的电子邮件所吸引 也就是在画面中央的

which act like mainline stars.

就像是一线明星一样

And all the names are handwritten.

所有这些名字都是手写的

Sometimes you do this data and this work with real-time data

有时候你可以这样来处理实时数据

to illuminate a specific problem in a specific city.

去阐释一个城市里发生的某个具体的问题

This is a Walther PPK 9mm semiautomatic handgun

这是一把沃尔特-PPK式9毫米自动手枪

that was used in a shooting in the French Quarter of New Orleans

它被用于2年前情人节在新奥尔良法国区

about two years ago on Valentine's Day in an argument over parking.

一起因停车问题的争吵而引发的枪击事件中

Those are my cigarettes.

这些是我的香烟

This is the house where the shooting took place.

这是那幢发生枪击的房子

This project involved a little bit of engineering.

这个项目包含一点工程学

I've got a bike chain rigged up as a cam shaft,

我用自行车的链条组装成了一个凸轮轴

with a computer driving it.

由计算机驱动

That computer and the mechanism are buried in a box.

整个计算机和机械被放在一个盒子里

The gun's on top welded to a steel plate.

这把手枪被焊在一个钢铁盘上面

There's a wire going through to the trigger,

有一根电话线穿过扳机

and the computer in the box is online.

盒子里的计算机是联网的

It's listening to the 911 feed of the New Orleans Police Department,

它连接着911新奥尔良分局的输入口

so that anytime there's a shooting reported in New Orleans,

因此在新奥尔良只要有枪击案上报

(Gunshot sound)

（枪声）

the gun fires.

这把手枪就会开火

Now, there's a blank, so there's no bullet.

现在它是空的 里面没有子弹

There's big light, big noise

会有明亮的灯光和嘈杂的声响

and most importantly, there's a casing.

更重要的是 那里有个盒子

There's about five shootings a day in New Orleans,

在新奥尔良 每天会有五个枪击案

so over the four months this piece was installed,

所以在这个装置装好后的四个月

the case filled up with bullets.

这个盒子就装满了子弹

You guys know what this is -- you call this "data visualization."

大家都知道这是什么 你们把它叫做“数据可视化”

When you do it right, it's illuminating.

你正确的利用它就会很有启发

When you do it wrong, it's anesthetizing.

你若做错了就会让人麻痹大意

It reduces people to numbers.

它会让生命变成数字

So watch out.

所以务必要当心

One last piece for you.

最后一件要跟你们分享的事

I spent the last summer as the artist in residence

去年夏天 我以一名艺术家的身份

for Times Square.

驻扎在时代广场

And Times Square in New York is literally the crossroads of the world.

纽约的时代广场算得上是世界的交叉路口

One of the things people don't notice about it

而人们没有注意到的是

is it's the most Instagrammed place on Earth.

它也是全球发Instagram最多的地方

About every five seconds, someone commits a selfie

在时代广场

in Times Square.

约每五秒钟就有人在一张自拍照下面评论

That's 17,000 a day, and I have them all.

也就是明天17000条 我全都收集了起来

(Laughter)

（笑声）

These are some of them with their eyes centered.

这些是人们目视正中心的照片

Every civilization,

每一种文明

will use the maximum level of technology available to make art.

都最大程度地利用科技去创造艺术

And it's the responsibility of the artist to ask questions

这也是艺术家的责任去发出疑问

about what that technology means

科技意味着什么

and how it reflects our culture.

科技如何反映我们的文化

So I leave you with this: we're more than numbers.

所以我想告诉你们的是 我们不仅仅是数字

We're people, and we have dreams and ideas.

我们是人类 我们有梦想和创意

And reducing us to statistics is something that's done

把人简化成数据

at our peril.

是将我们自己至于险境

Thank you very much.

谢谢

(Applause)

（掌声）