MAI Blog

SCSD – Smart citizen sentiment dashboard

Smart Citizen Dashboard © Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens
Smart citizen sentiment dashboard (SCSD) is an interactive installation that visualizes the feelings of São Paulo’s citizens regarding some of the challenges faced by the city. The project collects the feedback of the citizens through a simple interface, and shows this data in the media facade of the Galeria de Arte Digital (FIESP). In this way SCSD transforms the media facade of FIESP into a point for social encounter where some of the issues affecting the quality of life in the city can be openly discussed. The installation was created by Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens with the support from Verbe Cultural and Galeria de Arte Digital do SESI-SP.

For the realization and development of the project the artists organized workshops with some inhabitants of São Paulo. The workshops let them identify some of the most pressing issues of the city and gave them important input for the design of the installation. The participatory strategy also let the artists translate the questions of the citizens into a visually appealing language that could deliver a message about the quality of life in the city, and at the same time be easily understood by anyone.

The dashboard gives the participants the opportunity to comment on five different issues namely, environment, mobility, security, housing, and public space. By swiping an RFID card over the interface they can easily express if they are happy, dissatisfied or if that particular issue is indifferent to them. However, the project is not only about playful interactions. The data provided by the participants is collected and stored in a sentiment database that is also visualized and displayed in the FIESP’s media facade. Thus, the smart citizen sentiment dashboard shows the general mood of the city and highlights the points where more work is needed.

Workshops Smart Citizen Dashboard © Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens Smart citizen sentiment dashboard © Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens

SCSD Technique


For the realization of the project the artists used the local travel card, called Bilhete Unico, a unique ID carried on a daily basis by millions of public transport users. This card offered an easy way to interact with the installation and avoid the distortion of the data collected by the repeated use of the installation by over engaged users. This characteristic was used by the authors to analyze the data collected and the behavior of different users. They found three main behaviors: serious accounting for 17% of the interactions, repetitive with 55%, and playful with 28%.

Smart Citizen Dashboard © Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens Smart Citizen Dashboard © Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens

Smart citizen sentiment dashboard credits


Project: Nina Valkanova and Moritz Behrens
Pictures: Verve Cultural
Video & production: Verve Cultural
and Galeria de Arte Digital do SESI-SP

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