Stephanie Rothenberg, University at Buffalo, Department of Visual Studies
I am an artist working at the intersection of social justice and emerging technologies. My current project “Reversal of Fortune: Garden of Virtual Kinship” uses a live garden to show the circulation of microfinance as it is exchanged from the developed to developing world and under accessed regions in the West. The project examines this flow of capital through the process of crowdfunding – the collective pooling of resources for a common goal (the Kickstarter phenomena). Currently, the primary source of data being collected is from the charity-based website www.kiva.org. The garden collects microfinance data from this website which triggers an automated watering system. Plants represent borrowers and their livelihood (receiving water) is dependent on the success of transactions (their loan being funded and their ability to pay it back). Through the poetic gesture of a garden and its struggle to survive, the complex relationship between human life and economic growth is made visible.
More broadly I am interested in what happens behind the scenes in the world of microfinance – in its claim to alleviate global poverty who is actually profiting and what it is the actual economic reality for this new market of debtors. In Kiva’s model, where exactly is this money being redirected leading to the exorbitant interest rates borrowers are charged?
Project website: http://www.pan-o-matic.com/projects/reversal-of-fortune-the-garden-of-virtual-kinship
Contact: sjr6@buffalo.edu
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