107,594 is the estimated number of Iraqi civilians who died from violence since the US-led invasion, as of October 29th 2010 (Source: Iraq Body Count). To me, the number is so big that can only exist on computers. Using my body, I want to feel the magnitude of this number and the scale of the war destruction by writing the information of the victims on index cards. Since November 19th 2010, I have been writing the cards every day for an hour.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
What am I really doing?
As I'm preparing and printing the excel documents, I finally realize what Jeannie said on my review board in Spring. By copy the names from the excel doc to the index cards, what exactly has I done? I don't feel that i'm transforming the data at all. So, I think at this point, what makes this work still meaningful is for me to experience the numbers of death via writing the names down.