Monika Seyfried

Monika is an Interaction Designer with a background in art, photography and filmmaking. In her work, she engages at the intersection of emerging technologies, digital media and the natural environment, creating sensory rich, interactive spaces. Monika’s passion is to build immersive experiences; mixed reality worlds that blend the digital and physical, working with a speculative mindset and experimenting with design approaches.

Grow Your Own Cloud is an art-science collective initiated by Cyrus Clarke (FR) and Monika Seyfried (PL). Since 2017, they have researched possibilities and applications of DNA data storage, exploring the materiality of data and links to climate change, while seeking to demonstrate alternative visions for the future which enrich the user experience. Grow Your Own Cloud has engaged the public through several award-winning works, such as  Data Flower Shops and Data Garden.

The Urban Data Forest

Urban Data Forest shows how we can re-imagine nature in 2050 in The City of The Hague by transforming urban spaces into Universal Biological Cloud Facilities. It uses DNA Data Storage technology to utilise plants and other forest “non-living” organisms for data storage and monitoring, while creating new regenerative green data infrastructure. Urban Data Forest provides ways to store and retrieve information from plants on site, in the city.

Grow Your Own Cloud wants to redesign the data cloud and to respond to the increasing demand for data storage and its consequences for the environment. The project explores a future in which sustainable data storage in the city is the key to cleaner, greener and more prosperous cities. The Urban Data Forest is the result of a S+T+ARTS residency with Witteveen+Bos and In4Art that recalibrates our relationship with urban nature and how DNA data storage will change the urban layout.