July 2026

 Hoooooo boy, it's been a big month for small Emma!

 
July marks the end of the academic year, which should mean I get to chill out a bit, but this year I decided to take on an insane extracurricular project (more on that later). Job number one for me and Keir though, was to clear out the MA Design for Data Vis studio ready for next year. 

Is there a greater joy than an evening walk through South London streets and parks on a balmy summer's evening with someone cute?! (This is maybe one of my favourite digital paintings I've ever done?!)

 Well, it is maybe matched by going to the tip and ikea with someone cute, on a balmy summer's evening.

And maybe that in turn is matched by having your fav friends from another city come and have tasty dinner at your place on a balmy summer's evening (can you tell I like cute people and balmy summer's evenings, and have been having a lot of joy this month?!) 

 
Look I could keep that whole thing running even longer. What a joy to meet a friend on a sunny summer weekend and go see some good (?) art! (I thought the Liam Young show at the Barbican was good, and kind of like nothing I'd ever experienced before — I recommend a visit before it finishes)

Anyway back to that ridiculous extracurricular project I mentioned. 

I called it 'The Data Emporium', and wanted it to somehow bring together my work teaching design for data vis, my general visual diarying vibe, and make it something that other people could get involved with. And so, I won a funding bid from the university to build and run this ridiculous live-action participatory data vis installation, and run it at EMF camp. It turned out, conceptualising the thing and winning the funding was the 'easy' bit. Building it was much harder, though that was mostly due to having certain conditions attached to the funding which involved having to work with arcane university purchasing systems (which meant many things I needed arrived late or not at all).

Anyway, two things I needed to do were to obtain a LOT of sticky dots, and to riso print these worksheets I designed, both of which I accomplished this day.

Went to a university conference/staff development day thing and was quite looking forwards to it, but it turned out to be a series of depressingly luke-warm takes about AI (admittedly with one or two fun highlights). Here's a montage of some doodles I did during. (Should I publish my opinion about this 'out loud'? Oh well, I have done now)

In summer tradition, the house is full of flies. I enjoy my electric fly swatter.
 

Went to the RA Summer Exhibition with mum, as is our annual tradition. This is my take on my favourite piece from this year: 'Somebody talks about the desert, the wet drips down the tropical eaves' by Joseph Grigely — an assemblage of assorted scraps of paper with scrawled notes and drawings, which somehow added up to more than the sum of their parts (which I've kind of been having the realisation is a lot of what I do in my own work)

Also I had a nosebleed, lol (luckily not at the summer exhibition)

 
Had an absolutely insane ride on the tube back from my Samaritans shift as three enormous concerts kicked out at once, at various points along the Jubilee line (My Chemical Romance at Wembley for the goths, Ludovico Einaudi at the O2 for the Classic FM fans, Pitbull at Hyde Park for... well, whoever those people are) 

This one is for my boss Keir, who keeps telling me I need to log off (I will never log off)

It is... STILL somehow too hot

That's my girl.

Last minute EMF panic prep — the incredible EMF installations team collecting my installation boards and materials in their van to drive to the site, plus furious last minute laminating, packing and trying to predict every possible eventuality and what stationery might meet my needs.

And then packing my bag, while the weather was still a little uncertain. Would it rain?! Would it heatwave?! Would it storm?! (Spoiler alert: it was simply hot, as it has been, and apparently will continue to be)
 

Finally — time to go to EMF Camp. 

Electromagnetic Field Camp (EMF) is described on its own website as:

“A non-profit camping festival for those with an inquisitive mind or an interest in making things: hackers, artists, geeks, crafters, scientists, and engineers.”

The four-day festival with approximately 3,500 attendees primarily consists of a vast programme of esoteric talks and practical workshops, accompanied by a wide range of art installations, pop-ups, creative technology projects and other communal activity spaces. The entire festival is overseen and run by over 300 volunteers, with everything from design, logistics, infrastructure and facilities supervised and/or run by the EMF community. (I did a load of design stuff this festival and last festival, including the attendee booklet, wristbands, and bunting!)

The festival brings together an extraordinarily diverse selection of people from across the UK, Europe, and beyond, who seem to share a sense of curiosity, engagement and participatory spirit that is like few other events of its scale, in my experience.

Attendees often camp in small ‘villages’ (for example, hosted by regional hackspaces, companies, or other shared interest groups), who often host their own off-programme activities and events, meaning that the entire site is just full of STUFF HAPPENING, with few attendees not also being part of some kind of creative endeavour of their own which adds to the overall richness of experience across the long weekend.

There's also raving at night :)

I travelled over to Ledbury with V and Ada, and met my colleague Keir and one of our MA students Erica on site (as well as another LCC colleague Dolica, the installations team Jonathan and Becca, and Amy, Mike and Sophia, just a few other members of the design team). I've been to the last two festivals (2022 and 2024) and already always feel like part of a big weird family when I go there.

Anyway, we immediately got the installation piece up and running, and perhaps entirely as predicted, everyone wanted to get involved immediately, which was an exhausting joy.

EMF runs from Thursday to Sunday, and unlike at previous EMFs, I did not go to ANY talks or workshops, and barely spent any time exploring the site compared to usual. I did manage to have a bit of a walk round on the Friday though, and see some cool stuff and meet some interesting people. Mostly though, I was just running my installation (with Keir's help), which was pretty all consuming, but very very fun.

It was only by the Saturday though, that I really started to get a sense of whether the installation was actually working as intended — i.e. the data visualisations were expanding, and more contributions from all sorts of people were flooding in. Keir had to leave for the weekend to go to a friend's wedding, but on the Saturday, EMF pal Bel helped me run the piece (very helpfully!)

And finally on Sunday, I was supported by MA student Erica to get the piece to its intended final form. In the words of my fancy academic write-up:

Framed as a ‘one stop shop for data’, the emporium was an interactive installation space with a focus on analogue, human-centred data-collection, undertaken playfully and experimentally by attendees of EMF camp.

EMF camp has always collected deep, rich data on a wide range of aspects of its events. With a combination of sensors placed around the site, trackers for various functions (like beer cup returns, bus transport, internet connectivity and more), the EMF community’s passion for data collection and analysis is clear.

We wanted to expand on this by encouraging a new, more participatory approach to data gathering and visualisation. For the 2026 EMF camp, we ran an interactive installation and activity station which enabled festival-goers to get hands-on with data collection, and see their insights transformed into bold, playful, collaborative visualisations which offered fun new insights into the collective EMF experience.

We wanted to ask attendees the question: What matters to you? Be it tiny spiders, steampunk accessories, mysterious aerials, quality toilet experiences, or any other aspect of their time at EMF, we facilitated interactive data gathering using hands-on, analogue collection methods, and brought it all together into a bold, entertaining installation piece which grew and changed over the course of the festival.

And look, it worked. (Some pics here and here). Extraordinarily well, in terms of what I'd hoped it would accomplish. Super high engagement, loads of laughter and great conversations with people, loads of interest in the masters course, and we met SO many incredible people (some offers to come and run the piece again in different contexts, some offers to come and speak at other universities around the country, and a bunch of other potential collaborators in various directions).

Standing in a field, exhausted, next to this big good mess of hundreds of willing participants silly little drawings, sticker collections, insights and experiences, I just felt truly truly blessed to get to call this kind of stupid project my job (more even than that — kind of a career triumph).

I stayed one more night, travelling back on the Monday, and did these wonky drawings about my EMF highlights on the train home with V and Ada again.

I had been so stressed in the build up to EMF that I had been imagining I would take it easy afterwards, but what I had not quite been ready for was the fact that a) lots of stuff I had been putting off would now need urgent attention, and b) the installation actually opened loads of doors that then needed pursuing...

Great time for my laptop to have a total meltdown! (Bad things about having a work laptop: random updates sometimes break everything / Good things about having a work laptop: when things go wrong sometimes Walt from IT can fix it?!?!)

Just in time for me to do a whole load of online tutorials (because the other online MA I teach on does NOT stop for the summer)

A cool guy on my window.

Busy Saturday of nice things — a walk with Vicky, another tip trip, making some fancy sandwiches, going to the Quaker garden party with said fancy sandwiches, finishing playing Blippo+ with my partner (it's very good!) and going to see Sean Morley's Edinburgh preview 'Backchannel' (it's very good!)

KJ is here to help (possibly)
 

So the day before I left EMF Camp, I stumbled across an opportunity to pitch for another funded installation piece that was basically PERFECT for a second iteration of the 'Data Emporium' concept (look this is the month I became a real artist or something I guess). In collaboration with BFF* Justin and his collaborator Rob, we decided to go in for it.

*I am loling while calling him BFF, because he recently called me 'former housemate' in an instagram post, which I found an amusing way of describing our... 13-14 year friendship... My partner thought I should be offended by that description, as it drastically undersold it, but I mostly found it amusing. When called out on it (by my partner), J's argument was that actually 'former housemate' implies greater connection than mere 'friend'. But I'm going in hard with BFF, hahaha

 
And once we'd committed to the bit, there was nothing for it but to commit wholeheartedly (in between other tasks) (the deadline was the 30th) (and I actually dated this one wrong, it's the 28th, look I am all over the place okay)

 Furiously scheming

 
And then flinging in a wild punt for it and going to get my nails done. (We probably won't get it, but if we do, oh god, then we actually have to do it...)
 

In uncharacteristic Emma fashion, did some vaguely camping adjacent activities — a bushcraft workshop with a group of assorted London queers who occasionally drift together to do light apocalypse prep. Buried some childhood ghosts about not being able to light a fire! Also coincidentally it was George's birthday! Here we all are marshmallow toasting over a fire we made.

I just re-read that and it all sounds a bit incoherent and manic, oh well. Good news: tomorrow I hope to do nothing at all!! Maybe there might be other days in August where I do nothing at all, God willing.

See you all in a month... 

June 2026

I have had a BUSY MONTH! Sometimes too busy, and definitely sometimes too hot, but as someone who errs towards liking doing too much and the sunshine, I come to the end of it feeling... quite contented actually (albeit also sweaty, slightly sunburnt, and a little stressed)

One of the main things occupying my mind is that myself and colleague/co-conspirator/work-pal Keir won some funding to build and run an installation piece at EMF camp in mid July. On the one hand, it is a very silly, frivolous, stupid thing. On the other hand, the university are paying like £1500 for all the materials I need to do it (because they are convinced it has some kind of academic merit?!?!?!?), and it is one of the more professionally ambitious/creative things I have ever attempted to carry off. For stupid bureaucratic reasons, even though the festival is not until mid July, a condition of my funding was that all budget had to be spent by the end of June, which meant getting a lot of prep work done early. On June 1st, I was feeling... overwhelmed. (Spoiler alert, on June 30th I was still feeling... overwhelmed)

Sometimes the best thing to do when feeling overwhelmed is go for a little walk. Bonus if you see several neighbourhood cats just vibing.

I'm not actually teaching on any undergrad courses right now, BUT, my old UX students graduated this year, and it was extremely exciting and heartwarming to go to their grad show and see all their wonderful projects. (Just a small selection of, here!)

Another good thing to do if you're feeling overwhelmed is go out on a cute date. <3

The masters course I teach on (MA Design for Data Visualisation) ran a collaborative workshop for our students with those from MA User Experience Design. It was extremely silly and colourful and everyone involved seemed to have a brilliant time. (This is an abstract representation of that day)

Self explanatory, finger-painted visual diary. (I spent the day at my Quaker Meeting House as a volunteer for the London Festival of Architecture)

Popped down to Brighton to see Jade (and have the best hot chocolate of my LIFE at Knoops, I cannot stop thinking about it)

Part of my silly EMF installation involves making some weird experimental stamps. Here are some weird, experimental stamps of my friends.

We have a cute little bird bath in our front garden, which is pretty much exclusively used by crows.

Having my fruit moment (I love a nectarine)

ALSO having my Vinted moment (apparently a few years behind everyone else)

I am sad about David Hockney!! He was one of my favourite artists. His ipad paintings have been a big inspiration to me. Also my garden is poppin' off, so I tried to do it (vaguely) Hockney style. 

Walked the first section of the Vanguard Way with friend Alice. This is admittedly a bit of a distraction from my main London Loop goal (which I have not found the time to do in many months), but the Vanguard way is tantalising because it is SOUTH and thus much easier to get to. Gorgeous day for it too.

 
Then I went to the very good Hurvin Anderson show at Tate Britain and decided to try the same garden scene in his style (even less successfully, but fun to have a go)

Having a brief moment of fun with the digital 'oil' brush though, I also decided to do another bit of Disco Elysium fan art (I am playing the game very slowly because uggghhh it is so good and I do not want it to end!! It is a little treat at the end of very busy days)

 

 

I have altogether too many objects in my life which kinda suck but are still stubbornly functional in a way where I really cannot justify getting rid of them.

 

 

My partner taught me how to use the hoe and I got really excited about hoeing (until it got too hot to hoe)
 

Work asked me to get some professional headshots taken for a thing and I have not yet received them back but I already know I am going to hate them, because I hate my face in pretty much every photo, and even though the man was very nice, there's only so much he can do isn't there

In other 'oh god this is too much work' news, I also organised and ran a mini conference at LCC (with Keir) — it was GREAT and lots of fun but a great deal of my day was spent furiously attempting to combat the stifling heat in the space we had booked, running around bringing attendees ice lollies and cold drinks.

Immediately after the conference, I ran straight over to Liverpool Street and got on a train to Norwich for a mini mini break with V, old GFSC pal honor, and 5 other lovely folks from the White Pube discord, for a weird little artists retreat/bird-watching/river-swimming/hot-tub break.

It was EXTREMELY wholesome. We booked a huge sprawling airbnb in the countryside and on Saturday drove in two cars over to Norfolk for a swim in the Wensum (I had never done a river swim before! The weather/water was PERFECT) and a ferocious wood-fired sauna on the riverbank. We also went round the cathedral, had delicious home-made dinner by one of the others, and lay in the garden hot-tub until late, gossiping as the sun went down and bats flew around. VERY NICE!!

But also very brief — home on Sunday morning via cursed rail replacement bus, but here is a depiction of hot-tub aglow with bats, which is a much nicer thing to draw. I felt very welcomed by this lovely gang of people, over half of whom I didn't know before this weekend.

 

The weather in Norfolk was just lovely. Warm but not too warm. I am quite tolerant of high temps, so the next day being 30 degrees didn't worry me too much.

A lot of teaching got cancelled this week. I kept up my scheduled tutorial session, simply because it was in one of LCC's only air conditioned rooms. This is fine.

This, however, is probably not fine. All week curtains closed, windows closed, just desperately trying to keep the flat cool (we are actually quite blessed with this place, in that it's ground floor, gardens front and back, solid old brick construction, so it could be a lot worse). Still though, my focus and productivity were kind of shot, but I had to just keep pushing as there was too much to do.

 

Weirdly this day was the worst day, despite being slightly cooler than the previous one, technically. The cumulative effect, I guess. And yes these are very lazy visual diaries, but in my defence IT WAS VERY HOT AND I HAD A LOT OF OTHER WORK TO TRY AND DO OKAY

Part of the reason I had a lot of work to do was because I was going on holiday (yes, again — I have had a silly couple of months, but with the exception of EMF which feels more like work than hols, I don't think I am going away again this summer/year)

Anyway, this was a holiday with my parents, which is not something I have done since probably being in my teens!? But you know, they're not getting any younger (and neither am I) and we don't spend loads of time together, so I suggested that it might be nice, and they were kind enough to bring me along on one of their 'Warner breaks'. Runnymede on Thames is basically still London (on the same commuter train line I used to take to get to Battersea, just around 35 mins further out), and is very scenic. The hotel's clientele were almost exclusively 60+, but I was mostly just OVERJOYED to arrive at a place with AC, and both an indoor and outdoor pool, which I immediately submerged myself in after a sweltering journey.

On Saturday we had a day out to Hampton Court Palace which was fun enough but it was still TOO HOT and I was very glad to return to the hotel and immediately get back into the pool.

On Sunday the temps were much more reasonable, so I went out for a brisk solo walk along the Thames to the site of the signing of the Magna Carta (where there are a number of cool art things), and looped back along into Egham with the intent of going to Staines and Egham Quaker meeting... but it turned out to be permanently closed! Very sad, but equally: more pool time for me, back at the hotel. 

Talking of which, in the afternoon mum and I went to aqua fit and it was extremely silly and fun. Maybe I could get into this old people holiday thing...

Would I do it again, though!? The food is all inclusive dinner and breakfast, and while it left some to be desired for me (as a vegan), I think for most people it'd be pretty good. The room was lovely (I really like staying in nice hotel). As mentioned, pretty much everyone else there was like, 60+, so I didn't exactly socialise, but the vibes were mostly chill. The evening entertainment was extremely not my thing. (But my evening entertainment was going back to my room to play disco elysium after several games of backgammon with dad). The spa and general hotel facilities were SWEET, and the location was real nice. Honestly I would return!! (Esp if mum and dad pay again ;)

The weekend was not totally without work though, as I did have to do some marking and freelance work while I was there, which was a shame. But in part that was because I knew the day after I got back me and Keir were taking our students on a field trip to Kew Gardens, so I wouldn't be able to get anything done! Again, the weather was just perfect and we had an absolutely lovely day doing a cute little data gathering/visualisation task with them. Here's my silly data vis of all the plants me and Keir spotted in the temperate house that were born in the same year as me. (This was lovely — then I went home and worked straight through from 18.00 until like 22.00 because several clients need everything all at once, ugh, but also thanks clients I guess).

July looks set to be similarly manic but also filled with lovely stuff. Pray for not another heatwave at EMF pls, or we will all die 💀