Spam Plants + Spam Architecture, visualizing the spam rhythm

Spam Plants

Amongst the many attempts of extracting art *visualizing* spam, many have miserably failed establishing a loose connection between the email data feed and the generated graphic. It’s not just a question of aesthetical values, but also of representing the obscure and overwhelming core nature of spam, or, in other words, its pervasive bulimic heart. Spam Plants and Spam Architecture by Alex Dragulescu (also author of Blogbot) are two interesting exceptions. Using artificial intelligence algorithms the artist develops virtual 3D sculptures based on the patterns found in the so-called junk mail. The number of ‘viagra’ and its wordy re-formulations recurrences or the lists of drugs usually proposed for sale are influencing the developments of flowers’ petals or new planes in an architectural abstract structure, with a visual correspondence between the specific content of spam and the chosen aesthetic. Actually ASCII values found in the text are determining the attributes and qualities of the outcome. But what’s even more interesting is that this analytic and scientific approach can reveal the inner ‘rhythm’ of the inner verbal schemes that characterize the spam communications. This is the theoretical goldmine of every spammer, and can be even thought as a testbed of future invasive marketing strategies, here visualized in beautiful (or scaring, it depends on the perspective) forms.