Computer Mediated Collage: Notes and Future Directions

The eighteen collages that accompany this description were the result of a pilot research project spurred on by a broader interest in the intersection between visual methods, ethnographic approaches, and practice theory. We asked participants to make a collage illustrating a domestic space they could imagine using to relax, and we also asked participants to include a particular form of technology in the imagined space of their collage. In prior research comparing the collages with a set of poems elicited with a similar prompt, we noted key differences relating to meaning. The focus here is not on the study, but rather on the possibility of computer mediated collage techniques as a mode of visual research. We also discuss using Polyvore, an online service, as a tool for data collection, and speculate on further possibilities for the elaboration, deployment, and application of computer mediated collage, as well as potential modes of analysis for the data it generates.