The Air We Share
Creative Development
"The Air We Share" is a unique initiative focused on addressing air pollution in Galway City through a blend of art, community education, and citizen action.
The project, a key measure of the Galway City Council Climate Action Plan, aims to raise awareness about air pollution, its causes, and its impacts on health and the environment. It does so by making air quality data publicly accessible and using it as inspiration for sensory, artistic representations.
The primary challenge for this project was to build a dynamic, visually striking, and interactive online experience that showcased real-time air pollution data collected by seven monitors across the Westside of Galway.
In addition, the project involved three artists in residence who would collaborate with the local community to create visual representations of the data over the course of 12 months. This project had to be ready in just three weeks to be launched at the Westside Arts Festival in July 2024.
The website needed to not only display the air quality data but also be flexible enough for regular updates as the project progressed. It had to reflect the art-inspired focus of the project while ensuring the data remained accessible to the local community.
We partnered with Algorithm, a Dublin-based creative studio, to execute their beautiful design vision within a tight timeframe. Leveraging Next.js and Headless WordPress, we built an easily navigable, fully responsive, and visually captivating website. Hosted on AWS Amplify and an AWS EC2 instance, the site offered seamless scalability and performance to handle real-time air quality data display.
To meet the project’s evolving needs, we designed the backend to be flexible. The content management system allowed administrators to update and modify various aspects of the website without needing to code, ensuring a streamlined and user-friendly experience for the team.
The site dynamically integrated air quality data while showcasing the project’s artistic output, creating an engaging blend of data and visual storytelling.
The website successfully launched on time at the Westside Arts Festival in July 2024. It featured a sleek, responsive, SEO ready, accessible website that seamlessly integrated real-time air pollution data and artistic visualisations, bringing to life the project’s mission to “make the invisible visible.” The flexible WordPress system empowered the team to continue updating the site with fresh content, art, and data as the project progressed.
The Air We Share project highlights our ability to deliver creative and technically complex projects under tight deadlines. By combining a dynamic content management system with innovative design, we created a platform that could evolve alongside the project’s goals, while providing a visually striking and informative experience.
This project is a testament to our expertise in blending technology, art, and community-focused initiatives. It also showcases our commitment to delivering impactful, purpose-driven digital experiences that engage audiences and inspire positive change.
