Visualisation Institute Spring Symposium 2026

The UTS Visualisation Institute is dedicated to initiating and accelerating research projects that use visualisation to critique, engage, and positively transform our industries and communities. Join our annual free program of roundtables, showcases and workshops, which open conversations around current research projects, and foster future collaborations.

Image: Greg Ferris, process work 2026

THURSDAY 29 OCTOBER

10 – 11.30am Unresolved: Challenges of Working with AI in Creative Industries
UTS Building 11, level 04, room 400

This panel brings together practitioners and researchers from sound, games, and interaction design to explore unresolved challenges emerging as AI becomes part of creative work. Through real industry cases, the panel will examine tensions around judgement, authorship, expertise, ethics, control, and changing creative practices. Including UTS researchers Ian Stevensen, Dale Grant, Baki Kocaballi and industry experts Jad Al-Masri from Motif,Selin Akbasogullari from ABC and George Mitri from Polylop Games.

11.30 – 12.45pm Disruptive Methods
UTS Building 11, level 04, room 400

A 'method share' session where VI members from different disciplines/areas each share a visual research method, followed by a roundtable conversation. Presenters include: Deborah Szaprio on using Ethnographic Action Research to design comics, illustrations and films as effective prompts in co-design workshops; Linda Matthews on using visualisation software to create sculptural work for the exhibition Theatre of Life; Suneel Jethani on Surveillance and the media(ted) city, and; Sarah Jane Jones on how following the colour yellow can reveal hidden infrastructure, services and people in public spaces.

12.45–1.30pm lunch

1.30 – 3.30pm UTS x Powerhouse Research Design Sprint
UTS Building 11, level 04, room 400

A research design sprint to brainstorm projects based on three objects/collections, presented by the Powerhouse research team. This session will include an introduction to the UTS x Powerhouse Partnership and new Research Incubator program with seed funding available for selected projects.

A pre-briefing information pack will be sent out the week of the event.

3.30–5pm Data Arena showcase
UTS Data Arena, Buiulding 11 - Enter Via Jones Street

A suite of creative practice research projects shown in the Data Arena and foyer, including new work from Greg Ferris, Justin Harvey, Andrew Burrell, Charles Marlow and The Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Fashion + Textiles, RePlace and students from UTS Fashion + Textiles, TAFE NSW Lidcombe, Fashion Design Studio TAFE NSW

• Greg Ferris: Developed for the centenary of Harry Houdini’s death on Halloween 1926, thREShold 360 (1999–2026) presents a stereoscopic 360-degree environment, based on the Houdini Séance Room at Los Angeles’s Magic Castle. A MIDI theremin translates contactless hand gestures into interactions with this spectral space, extending the work’s investigation of technologically mediated presence and absence. [header image & image 6 below]

• Justin Harvey: "NOT BOT ❤️ NOT BOT” (2026)
  NOT BOT meets its match in a sloppy love song mash up for the GenAI generation. [image 1 below]

• Charles Marlow: Forest of the.Cloud (2026) is an Interactive digital exhibition visualising the Internet as a forest of mushrooms, while also demonstrating its capabilities for efficient and engaging communication. [image 2 below]

• Andrew Burrell: Maングrove (2026) Who is the Mangrove Queen, and how might we listen to what she has to say? Join in this live Xenomancy session and seek answers from the Mangrove Queen to your most pressing ecological conundrums. [image 3 below]

• The Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Fashion + Textiles, RePlace and students from UTS Fashion + Textiles, TAFE NSW Lidcombe, Fashion Design Studio TAFE NSW: Transparent Threads (2026) [image 4 below]
  
  

5–7pm Objects of Research, HDR led zine launch with drinks and networking.
UTS Building 11 Foyer, Cnr Jones st. and Broadway

Objects of Research was an exhibition that showcased how practice-based and creative research methods can innovate, drive critical thinking, and translate research findings for multiple audiences. By shining a light on artefacts that emerge through research processes, this showcase demonstrated how practice can be used as a mode of inquiry. Risoprinted by Pinch Press.

The launch includes works by:

Giovanni De Santolo; Kelly-Ann Denton; Anna Dickson; Frances Harvey; Margaret Jacobsen; Dr Thea Kable; Kenneth Lambert; Corey Lange; Holly O’Neil; Haihan Li (Ocean); Ben Styles; Lisa Sweeney

and Tarot readings by Dani—The cards hold the answers. [image 5 below]