Performative Data

This Research & Knowledge Exchange Doctoral Project brief summarises our priority areas of research interest under the heading of: Performative Data: Materialising the Abstract Through Immersive and Interactive Media

We welcome all research degree applications aligned with and in response to this brief.

This is a funded opportunity.

This doctoral research project investigates how data can be transformed into performative experiences using immersive and interactive media. While data is often perceived as abstract, it shapes the material conditions of daily life. Through interdisciplinary and practice-led research, the project explores how environmental, biometric, economic, and geopolitical datasets can be reimagined through digital performance. 

The project engages with critical questions around the aesthetics, ethics, and politics of data representation. It will interrogate how performance and digital systems mediate data and how immersive practices can highlight biases and assumptions embedded in data collection, processing, and visualisation. 

Working across virtual and augmented reality, projection mapping, and generative systems, the project draws from critical data studies, feminist and new materialist theory, and science and technology studies. It will foster new modes of audience engagement with data and contribute to ethical and creative approaches to digital practice. 

This project is fully funded through Research England’s Expanding Excellence in England (E3) Fund. The deadline for applications is 25 May 2025, and applications can be made through the link below.

This project is hosted within the Centre for Blended Realities and supports the university’s priorities around immersive technologies, interdisciplinary digital arts, and critical data studies. 

All successful research degree project proposals must emphasise a clear alignment between the project idea and our Research & Knowledge Exchange strategy. 

• Dr Teoma Nacarrato, Research Fellow