Overview
Bloom is a 50ft x 10ft data art installation made of 500 hand cut cellophane squares.
The 14 clear/white squares makeup roughly 3% of the mosaic, the same proportion of Americans with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD). The blooms of color (red, blue, orange, or green) from those clear points distinguish which of those 3% are children vs. adults, as well as whether they are directly accounted for by the state, or estimated to exist by random generalized sampling.
Inside the building, representing the institutional perspective, the rigid series of “boxes” is prominent — structured in a way that reflects the categorical nature of a neuropsychological evaluation.
Outside the building, representing the human perspective, the mosaic reads as a beautiful cohesion of various vibrant blooms, only made possible by the unique combination of its categorical parts.
Bloom was exhibited in the West Kresge Stairwell at Michigan State University for a 24-hour exhibition on February 24, 2026 as part of a collective exhibition to encourage the integration of more public and installation art in campus buildings.