A vision of air

Abstract

The invisibility of air means that it is it easy to for us to ignore. Yet in recent times it has moved from being a presence that we rarely have to think about, to becoming a fear-provoking and unquantifiable substance, containing diseases and pollutants that need to be filtered out or blown away in order to be made safe. How, then, do we deal with such an invisible yet explicitly material entity? How do we see it? This article explores some of the different ways that air is exposed and visualized, from early scientific experiments with air through to the material consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. It moves through various fields of research: science and technology, art practice, public health, and building design; taking us through the identification, conceptualization, measurement and datafication of air, as well as the actuality of our experience. Ultimately, it is argued that to have any hope of achieving clean air, we must first learn to work through its invisibility and understand its precarity, through the formation of a broad community of practice