Kristin Roach wove 4,800 LEDs into a tapestry of Iowa's bird sightings

Convert bird sighting data into a large-scale interactive tapestry where viewers could descry — discern by looking carefully — the history and future of the birds visiting their backyard ecology.

Roach refurbished her loom over March–April 2021, then wove May through September: over 20,000 yards of wool, a gallon of walnut dye, 4,800 LEDs, microcontrollers and custom PCBs, all on one continuous warp over 20 feet long. She inlaid the LEDs into the weaving while on the loom; her partner Jason Shaw soldered and programmed them. The data is eBird, the Cornell Ornithology Lab's citizen-science project, displayed by month and year with the tapestry's centre approximating Iowa's centre. The piece was made possible by an Iowa Arts Council Grant and the National Endowment for the Arts.

The finished tapestry began making its way around the Midwest, letting visitors press the mounted touchscreen to discover the sighting patterns of Iowa's birds, including species like the Yellow-bellied Flycatcher whose boreal-forest breeding habitat is shrinking.

The Descrying Tapestry is an interactive wall hanging integrating art, craft and technology: visitors press a touchscreen mounted at its base to discover the bird sighting patterns of Iowa visitors. Artist Kristin M Roach named it after the verb 'descry' — to see something unclear or distant by looking carefully, to discern, to espy.

Many favourite songbirds breed in the Boreal Forest spanning Northern Minnesota across much of Canada, only passing through Iowa seasonally; as breeding habitat is destroyed, the chance of viewing a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher in a backyard diminishes. After painting these birds for her Junk Mail Migration series, Roach applied for the grant that made the project possible in fall 2021 — funded by the Iowa Arts Council Grant and the National Endowment for the Arts, with data from Cornell's eBird project.

The build: a loom refurbished March–April 2021, weaving from May to September, over 20,000 yards of wool and a gallon of walnut dye, 4,800 LEDs inlaid into the weaving while on the loom, then soldered and programmed by Roach's partner Jason Shaw, with microcontrollers and custom PCBs. The piece, which looks like two panels, is one continuous warp over 20 feet long; its centre approximates the geographic centre of Iowa, showing sightings by month and year. Completed, it began touring the Midwest.

Citizen-science data was the point: eBird sightings become legible when the display is something you approach and touch.

Weaving the electronics in on the loom kept the craft and the technology one object rather than a screen bolted to art.

The walnut-dyed wool and hand-inlaid LEDs carry the same care the data asks viewers to give the birds.

Species decline is abstract; a heat map of your own state, month by month, is not.

Data art earns its emotion in the material: the same heat map feels different when the LEDs are woven by hand into wool dyed with walnuts.

As of October 2022 the completed tapestry was making its way around the Midwest, documented in full on Roach's journal with process photographs from warping to wiring.