Ellie Balk

Where We Are Home
June, 2023
P.S. 007 Louis F. Simeone
80-55 Cornish Ave, Queens, NY 11373

2nd Installation

7.5’ x 24’

For more pictures and the full story read the captions and check out www.instagram.com/elliebalk

THE DATA:

When I came for my site visit at PS 007 in Elmhurst, Queens, the Principal showed me this walkthrough and I was so excited to make something for this space.

We talked about his students and their families and this neighborhood which is considered the most ethnically diverse in New York City.

I decided to start with a survey where I asked the students:

1. Where were you born?

2. Where were your parents born?

3. Where is Home?

4. What color do you think of when you think of Home?

We got nearly 500 completed surveys!

I used this data to create two different designs, one completed in 2022 and this one completed in 2023.

THE PALETTE:

The countries where the students and parents were born are color coded based on the most picked color selection from the question “what color do you think of when you think of Home?”

On view at Savant Studios
1463 Fulton Street
Brooklyn, NY 11216

June, 2022
P.S. 007 Louis F. Simeone
80-55 Cornish Ave, Queens, NY 11373

7.5’ x 24’

For more pictures and the full story read the captions and check out www.instagram.com/elliebalk

THE DATA:

When I came for my site visit at PS 007 in Elmhurst, Queens, the Principal showed me this walkthrough and I was so excited to make something for this space.

We talked about his students and their families and this neighborhood which is considered the most ethnically diverse in New York City.

I decided to start with a survey where I asked the students:

1. Where were you born?

2. Where were your parents born?

3. Where is Home?

4. What color do you think of when you think of Home?

We got nearly 500 completed surveys!

THE PALETTE:

The countries where the students and parents were born are color coded based on the most picked color selection from the question “what color do you think of when you think of Home?”

HOW TO READ IT:

THE X

The visualization is made on an x and y axis. The x axis crosses all windows horizontally. It breaks up the parent data on the top and the student data on the bottom. The countries are ordered by the distance from New York and are evenly spaced on the x axis. Their placement makes the point of the triangle.

THE Y

The y axis runs vertically for each column and shows the number of people from each country. The more people from a country, the larger the angle from the point on the x axis.

THE BACKGROUND and SIDES

Behind the triangles are solid colors that represent the aggregated percentages of the 7 regions of where the students and parents were born (taking out the number of students born in America)

THE INSPIRATION:

There were a lot of limitations and I struggled with the design. I wanted to create a standard unit of measurement, but nearly all the windows are different sizes. I wanted to show all the data, but the percentages were weighted. I needed to make this out of glass and I needed it to be installed in just 3 months from the data collection.

I was flipping through all my books. In #cartographiesoftime I found inspiration from this manuscript timeline for Olaf Stapledon’s classic 1930 science fiction novel, Last and First: A story of the Near and Far Future.

Here I saw that I could organize the data as sets for each column. In this way I could show the all the data using the same set of rule

Color Connections
International High School at Laguardia Community College

Long Island City, Queens New York

WHAT COLOR DO YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU THINK OF…..

POWER
FREEDOM
KNOWLEDGE

THE PAST
THE PRESENT
THE FUTURE

HOME
JOY
WHEN I CLOSE MY EYES

Artist Ellie Balk and math teacher Tricia Stanley in collaboration with the International High School at Laguardia Community College surveyed one hundred students to explore the connection between color, concept, time, and emotion. 

Students were asked what colors they thought about when they thought of the following abstractions: Power, Freedom, Knowledge, The Past, The Present, The Future, Home, Joy, and with their Eyes Closed. 

The respondents were asked to choose colors from a 64 color palette. Survey responses were then aggregated to create these stained glass windows that serve as a visual representation of each one hundred answers.

This project was made possible by the National Academy of Design through an awarded Prize grant.

September, 2022
Sanctuary Slimane
Marrakech, Morocco

Working with Sanctuary Slimane’s master ceramist Adil El Khaoua, Ellie created a 144 piece sundial spanning over 5 meters in diameter.

The design is laid out in sections that each represent an hour of time. There are 16 sections to show all the possible hours of sunlight throughout the year (5am-9pm) in Marrakech, where the work is installed, Brooklyn where Ellie lives, and Verbier Switzerland, a beloved place of Aziz and Sarah.

There are 12 colors in the design. Each specific color represents the summer and winter solstice and the spring and fall equinox for Marrakech, Brooklyn, and Verbier. The yellow colors represent Summer, the orange, red and purple are Fall, the greens are Spring and the blues are Winter. These colors line up to create a central design at the 11am-1pm section of the sundial. The order of the colors are based on the calculation of where the shadow would be casted at noon on the solstice and equinox days in each of the cities.

The colored lines that span out from the central design show the sunrise and sunset times for Marrakech, Brooklyn, and Verbier on the days of the solstice and equinox. For example, on the day of the Fall Equinox in Marrakesh, September 23 (represented as the brightest orange in the design), the lines point to 7:20am sunrise and 7:27pm sunset.

Ellie worked with a local metalsmith to create a gnomon using traditional Moroccan stained glass. The gnomon design and dimensions were based on several factors. The angle of the gnomon is 31 degrees which is the latitude of the place it sits in Marrakech, Morocco. The height of the gnomon was determined by the delineation of the sun on the Solstice and Equinox days. This allows the gnomon to cast a shadow at noon on any solstice or equinox that will line up with the sundial’s design and accurately depict the time. This means that on the Winter Solstice of 2022 on December 21, 2022, the shadow of the sun at noon will reach the outer edge of the light blue in the design.

A rod is welded to the base of the gnomon and fits into a cylinder cemented in the ground. This allows for the gnomon to be pivoted to account for daylight savings time and religious determination of time.

https://www.sanctuaryslimane.com

Middle College High School and International High School
at Laguardia Community College
45-35 Van Dam Street
Queens, NY 11101

Summer, 2021

We created a survey that asked “What Color do you think of when you think of home?” and “How far away is Home?”. We used the answers to those questions to create a color palette and 2 point perspective drawings. Painted on large panels, these images were installed on the pillars on the front of the building.

This project was made possible by New York City Artist Corps. It was led by Artist Ellie Balk with support from Artists Felmar Dean and Gabriela Alvarado. Lead student artists included: Lacey Gadatejo, Karen Marquez, Evelyn Flores, Jonathan Leal, Timothy Velez, Janeth Guaman, Doha Ahmed, Camila Payan, Itzel Rodriguez, Yalin Martinez, Alexis Barahona and Genesis Yupa.

Click HERE to access the survey to see how you compare to the students who made the mural.

Middle College High School
International High School
at Laguardia Community College
45-35 Van Dam Street
Queens, NY 11101

Summer, 2021

After over a year of remote learning, this project brings us together to celebrate us as individuals and shows how we are similar to and different from our peers.

We created a survey that asks questions about how we connect to each other, and how we think and feel about ourselves, others and the future. The answers to the questions are visualized as a color coded bar graph.

The color of the bar represents the specific answer to the question. The share of the bar is determined by the aggregated percentage of all the participants’ answers for the question. The bars are stacked to create a colorful data portrait.

This project was made possible by New York City Artist Corps. It was led by Artist Ellie Balk with support from Artists Felmar Dean and Gabriela Alvarado.

Lead student artists included: Lacey Gadatejo, Karen Marquez, Evelyn Flores, Jonathan Leal, Timothy Velez, Janeth Guaman, Doha Ahmed, Camila Payan, Itzel Rodriguez, Yalin Martinez, Alexis Barahona and Genesis Yupa.

2021
Spotify Headquarters
65th floor, World Trade Center, 4
New York

The Data:

When attempting to create a ‘chromatic definition of sound’, I developed a survey asking Spotifiers to match a set of words describing a range of emotion to both a color and a sound. The survey was distributed internally with the data informing the result.

The artwork displays the relationships between people’s associations of colors with words or songs.

How to read it:

The graph is centered upon a colored rectangle which is color-coded to reflect the word. The height of the shape is determined by how many people selected that color to word/song answer. The triangles to the west represent the selections of color to word that the participants selected, while the triangles to the east represent the selection from color to song. The length and width of each triangle are a representation of the percentage of people that selected that color for the word and song. The final work displays a collective chromatic definition of sound.

Click here for the Survey
Click here for the Playlist
Click here for the Data Spreadsheet

The Residents of Gouverneur
August-October, 2020

Gouverneur Hospital
227 Madison Street
Lower East Side Manhattan, New York

Building Wrap, 3’ x 137’
Acrylic on Polytab, installed

A project of NYC Health + Hospitals Arts in Medicine, funded by the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund

When I first met the residents and we talked about what this mural could be, I understood the strong connection to the Lower East Side.

I began my process by walking the neighborhood, taking pictures of the colors and using that to create my palette.

Each bar in the mural represents a resident that lives at the Gouverneur skilled nursing center and is color coded to show their birthday, age, what floor they live on and their zodiac signs and Chinese horoscope.

I hope people can find a connection to the residents by looking for their own birthday and horoscopes.

I am so happy I got to know the residents and staff at Gouverneur and we were able to provide an experience that allowed us to come together.

Because of the pandemic, most of the residents have not been able to see or be in contact with family members since March. It was an honor to be with them and a cherished memory for me.

Thank you Aly Maier and everyone who helped shape this project.

#lauriemtischilluminationfund
#nychealthandhospitals
#artsandmedicine
#datavisualization
#dataart
#dataportraits
#artheals

730 Third Avenue
Manhattan, New York

2020

Presented by ArtBridge with Nuveen, Taconic and TIAA

https://art-bridge.org/page/730-third-avenue-building-wrap/

This color-coded timeline compares the rate of change of personal savings, public debt, life expectancy, inflation, the DOW and social security data sets from 1960--PRESENT. The same image is reflected and installed on the left side and right side of the main entrance, both going back through time around the building. The background blocks of color delineate the decades and the black vertical bars depict each year. All the data has been aggregated to reflect the rate of change and is scaled based on the largest increase and decrease for each individual set of data.

GREEN: Personal Savings
YELLOW: Public Debt
BLUE: Life Expectancy (actual, not rate of change)
PINK/ORANGE: Inflation
TURQUOISE: DOW
ORANGE: Social Security (net rate of change)

All factors in the data sets show relevant patterns and changes that can influence how people fund their own retirement. We can see how changes in the Market and Inflation affect how people are saving and spending their money. We can see life expectancy increase and reliance on pensions decrease. All of these factors influence how people will have to prepare for and manage for their future.

CLICK HERE FOR DATA SPREADSHEET

Spring, 2019

Humboldt and Grand Street
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

https://bushwickdaily.com/bushwick/categories/arts-and-culture/6115-east-williamsburg-mural-blending-data-emotion

For 10 days select Williamsburg high school of arts and technology students and staff were asked to track their daily modes of communication and the moods they associated with those interactions. In collaboration with teachers Tricia Stanley and Marc Ottaviani, we worked with students to visualize their interaction data. 
Each square represents a person. The frame color identifies the age group, the inside circle identifies the different modes of communication and the background colors show the emotions associated with the interactions which are based on the Mood Meter. Click Here

This mural is on the South West corner on Humboldt at Grand Street in East Williamsburg. Last year, we created the Mood Meter Mural on the North west corner, flanking the entrance to East Williamsburg. Click here

We love that we can bring students outside of the school and into the community to create public art and add color and play to the neighborhood.

River Cities Population Timeline, 2019
Chroma in the Grove, St. Louis
4041 Chouteau Street

Floor paint on Pavement
7800 Square Foot

Project Website: https://www.sarahstreetstlouis.com/river-cities-mural

This mural graphs the population of St. Louis and 11 river cities, chosen by recent boom in tech culture, through time from 1900-2017. Circle graphs are sized based on current population and placed geographically in the space. Lines connect the circles, showing the distance in between the cities and creating shapes that play off of the geometric facets of the bollards.

The graphs show the total population by year and the rate of change in population by year. Each color is a city and a year. The outer ring/color represents the city color. The middle ring of the circle shows population over time, and the inside circle graph shows the percentage of increase in population over time.

The design sparks fun and engagement through its interplay within the physical space and with the data itself. For example, you might notice that years seeing a decline in population are not shown in the middle circle, where you see which years the city had its largest increase in population.

Text by Maggie St. Geme

More Images:
http://elliebalk.com/residencies-2/#/artist-residency-thailand/

Artist Residency Thailand: Lotus Residency
Prem International School
Mae Rim, Thailand

October-November, 2018

We worked with the Prem International 9th grade math students in transforming the outside of the Art House through a Lotus Residency at Art Residency Thailand. The students learned about drawing in two-point perspective and then wrapping the drawings around 3D space to change the perspective. The paintings are color coded based on collecting colors from the gardens around Prem in Mae Rim. The colors are placed in the paintings accordingly to the direction of the planes.

Program Director: Alex Soulsby
Lead Art Teacher: Liz Hassall

Cortex Innovation Community
4320 Forest Park Ave
St. Louis, MO 63108

May, 2018

A project of Wexford Science and Technology

A sister city is a sanctioned, agreed upon partnership between two communities in two countries. St. Louis has 16 sister cities spanning 5 continents. For these murals, data from our sister cities has been color-coded and visualized to create a series of 5 murals.

Assisted by: Jacob Berkowitz, Adrienne Sandusky and Kris Mosby

54 Noll Street
Bushwick, Brooklyn

June 2018
Project of Open New York

Instagram:  (https://www.instagram.com/open_newyork/) @open_newyork

Assisted by Marie Saint-Cyr and Madjeen Isaac

The design for this mural is based on the local map that is depicted in a slight warped perspective to give the feeling like one is flying over the area or coming into the map.  The image is slightly anamorphic as it follows the contours of the ceiling. The place where the mural exists is noted with a star symbol. By positioning the map in this way, when one is standing under of the image they will be placed in the map at the exact area of which they stand.

In an area that is seeing rapid changes, this mural creates a place where new residents and old residents can come together to celebrate home. People from the area see the map image and immediately recognize it as home, while people new to the neighborhood or passerbys might see it as a colorful abstraction. Once familiar with the area, people will find deeper connection to the image.  Having the image of a map where they are and seeing the larger context of where they live will hopefully inspire a connection to place. Being that this is a new development, I think the abstracted map image is a perfect connection, acknowledgement and welcoming to the neighborhood and will have a lasting positive impact.

Humbolt and Grand Street
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

May, 2018

Over the course of two weeks, students from the Williamsburg High School of Arts & Technology tracked their emotions using a “Mood Meter” grid of 100 words connected to 16 different colors.  Each day students named the specific emotion they were feeling and logged the corresponding color. The emotions fell under four color families; the deeper the color, the more intense the emotion.

Working with artist Ellie Balk and teacher Marc Ottaviani, each student transformed their emotional data into a graphic visualization.   The mural represents the collection of these visualizations and reveals the emotional makeup of this population of students.

November, 2017-May2019
Lambert International Airport, St. Louis, Missouri
Terminal 2, Baggage Claim One

The mural is an abstract map drawn from the street grid of a section of St. Louis City, but from a slight bird's-eye perspective. It gives the viewers the feeling of soaring over St. Louis in a plane.

“It looks like what you would see outside of the window seat,” Balk said. “I created the piece as one large map, and then it’s wrapped around the carousel, which evokes that action of walking around and seeing the whole thing, because it’s all connected.” 

Williamsburg High School of Arts and Technology
223 Graham Avenue
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

October, 2017

Summer 2017
5800 South Broadway, between Bates and Ellery
St. Louis, Missouri

Supported by CCBF, http://www.carondeletliving.com

#VISUALIZE PI 

2017

Artist Ellie Balk partners with students from the Green School to visualize the number Pi in 2-point perspective. Read left to right, the length of the vertical lines relate to the digits in Pi.  Each end point of the line has been connected to the two far vanishing points to create a 3-d landscape.  The colors in the mural come from the artists time in Senegal, Africa where she collected paint chips from walls then had them color matched here in the states.  

With support from The Green School, The Walentas Family Foundation, and The Grand Street BID

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VISUALIZE Pi
a graphic score

Opening May 5th, 2017 at Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis 

With Critical Mass for the Visual Arts

Composed by Ellie Balk

This graphic score visualizes Pi as a linear pattern of sound. There are 56 measures visualizing the first 89 digits of Pi. Each measure plays 9 beats where the digits of pi are accented. The color is coded to show the placement of the note within the score. 

Inspired by the artists time at Waaw Artists' Residency in Senegal, the score was originally written for the Sabar drum. The score has been performed by Swedish composer and pianist Eva Siden and has been edited and mixed by New York based musician LD Brown of Grey Reverend for this exhibition. 

CLICK HERE to hear the composition. 

CLICK HERE to hear the more about the piece. 

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2017

The Green School
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

A collaboration with math teachers Tricia Stanley and Brian Knoerzer where we integrated the geometry curriculm to teach volume through the creation of these wood panel perspective paintings.  The work was installed in the hallways and classrooms throughout the school. 

2016

The Green School
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Second installation of Transformations for the beautification of the front of the school.  A collaboration with math teachers Tricia Stanley and Brian Knoerzer, we integrated the curriculum teaching students about geometric transformations through the creation of this stained glass piece.  This work was supported by the Walentas Family Foundation.

2016
South Jefferson Ave
South City, St. Louis

Each panel 9.5"x12.5"

2016
PS34 Oliver H Perry
131 Norman Ave
Greenpoint Brooklyn, NY

You Are Here, Greenpoint is a mural that was painted at PS 34 as a community building experience during a festival. Students, parents, teachers, staff and community residents came together to create this colorful mural for the entrance of the school. Dots were added to the mural to show where participants lived, allowing them topersonalize and own their place on the mural.

Special thanks to James Sheehan for making it happen!

A mural project for Social Innovation Week in New York City.  A map of NYC and surrounding areas was created to look like a world map and set in the space to play with ones perspective.  The mural filled the whole space and was the center piece for the events that took place in the space. Special thanks to Julia Cocuzza and Chelsea Ritter-Soronen for their assistance. 

Social Innovation Week is a series of exhibitions, demonstrations, and lectures introducing new methods and ideas in Energy, Design, Food, Culture, and Environment. Located in Soho, the pop-up storefront will offer an innovation shop, exhibits, installations, lectures, and workshops.

WeTheSocial hopes to inspire the next generation of designers, engineers and creative leaders while making the ideas presented accessible to all visitors and participants. Social Innovation Week NYC is the inaugural event and exhibition in a series that will continue on to urban communities nationwide in 2016.

http://wethesocial.com/

2016
Boerum and Graham
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

What you're seeing is a visualization of the number pi. Each circle is sized and color coded to correspond to a digit in Pi. The background color represents the next digit. The first 184 digits of the irrational number can be read left to right starting at the left arrow.

Designed by artist Ellie Balk and painted by students from The Green School. Supported by the Walentas Family Foundation and the Graham Avenue BID.

LaunchCode Mentor Center
4611 Delmar Blvd
St. Louis, MO

LaunchCode is a non-profit organization that creates pathways to economic opportunity and upward mobility through apprenticeships and job placement in technology.

During their Mentor Center opening reception, LaunchCode invited artists Ellie Balk and Chelsea Ritter-Soronen to create an interactive art action.  The artists asked LaunchCode for a list of words that exemplified their mission to create a color-code installation for the new space.  

Commission for St. Alexius Hospital Medical Offices.  This map shows the neighborhoods of St. Louis City.  Painted on the elevator doors with enamel paint.  

The Green School
223 Graham Ave
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

May, 2015
Ellie Balk, Nathan Affield and The Green School Students
Manhattan Avenue and Grand Street (669 Grand Street)
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn 

#VISUALIZE Pi

This visualization of Pi is represented as a color coded bar graph drawn in one point perspective.  The digits of Pi can be read from right to left in the triangle image. Each vertical line represents 10 units where the color at the bottom correlates to the digit ofpi and the negative space represents the remainder number.   Here we see the digits of Pi: 3.14159 and also a reflection of that number 3.96951. The background acts as a key where each color corresponds with a number 1-9.  Zero is represented in the image as a empty space where the background shows through.

VISUALIZE Pi mural is a collaboration between Artist Ellie Balk, The Green School Students, staff and Assistant Principal Nathan Affield.  What you are seeing is a visualization of the number Pi (π=3.14159...) represented as a reflective line graph, reminiscent of a sound wave.  The colors are coded by the sequence of the prime numbers found in Pi (2,3,5,7).

#VISUALIZEPI
Follow us on IG @visualizepimural 
More info @ http://visualizepi.tumblr.com/

Boerum and Graham Ave in East Williamsburg, Brooklyn
2013

http://visualizepi.tumblr.com/

Students from the Green School constructed the golden spiral based on the Fibonacci Sequence and began to explore the relationship between the golden ratio and Pi. The number Pi was represented in a color-coded graph within the golden spiral. In this, the numbers are seen as color blocks that vary in size proportionately within the shrinking space of the spiral, allowing us to visualize the shape of Pi. 

10th grade Geometry students from Bronx Envision Academy created a pattern that was then taken through a composition of transformations.  For example, after they translated the pattern to quadrant one, they were given this set of instructions: T (4,0), R  (90), r (y-axis).  This created their whole tile image.

September 2012

RePop: Corner or Metropolitan and Roebling in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

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Press

This mural highlights the architecture of the building.  Inspired by a map of the area, the abstract image creates an illusion of flattening out the corner of the building creating a dynamic form that moves around the building. 

Moore and Graham Ave.
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

May-June 2012
Math Students from the Green School teamed up with the Borinquen Plaza Senior Center in creating this 3-D graph representing NYC high temperatures dating from 1930-to projected weather in 2060, the year the students would be eligible to use the Sr. Center.  This mural was supported by the LCB Grant, The Graham Ave BID, the Green School and The Borinquen Plaza Senior Center. 

Park ave at Grand Street Under the BQE
Clinton Hill, Brooklyn

Blog
Podcast
Press
360 Visual

September 2011
130’ community mural created by working with 9 pianists and drawing the             distance between their hands as they played Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata to create a musical landscape.  Funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, supported by Myrtle Avenue Revitalization Project.

The Green School
233 Graham Ave
Williamsburg, Brooklyn

blog

May-June 2011
I worked with high school math students in surveying the whole school, collecting  data on how they were feeling based on different times of the day to create a bar graph that resembles a cityscape. Made Possible by LCB Grant.

Vanderbilt and Dekalb

blog

June 2008
11’ Round. You Are Here is a Community Mural painted on the corner of Vanderbilt and DeKalb Ave: the exact center, both east and west and north and south, of where the neighborhoods of Clinton Hill and Ft. Greene meet.  The purpose of the mural is to connect these two diverse neighborhoods to raise awareness of just how close we are to each other.  The community added a dot where they live in hopes to connect the community, celebrating the idea of “home” for both old and new residents. It was funded by a generous grant from the Puffin Foundation, along with community organizations.

St. Edwards Street
Brooklyn, NY

press

2009
Collaborative Community Mural painted with the community on the Pavement in front of Community Roots Charter School with Livable Streets Initiative. 

Legacy

In June 2012, every student, faculty and staff member of PS 250came together to create a legacy.  Working with BRIC Teaching Artist Ellie Balk, Art Teacher Linnea Westerberg and Film Maker Erica Kermani, every person in the school created a self-portrait on glass. Organized by grade and color coded by class number, these tiles have been put together to create a mosaic for generations to see.  A special thank you to Principal Barnes, Magnet Coordinator Ms. Soriano and custodial engineer Luis for making this happen.

Juan Morel Campos
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn

2010
Worked with students from both ELA and Math Class to investigate ways in which they communicate.  We processed the information, creating graphs and charts, finalizing in creating a node that represented their information.  We then connected the nodes to form a social network. Installed at BRIC Contemporary Art Gallery, Brooklyn Heights.

Possible through teaching artist residency-BRIC Arts|Media|Bkyln

July, 2011

This was one of 88 pianos installed around New York City for Sing for Hope's interactive public art project.  My piano was placed at the Carousel at Prospect Park and I used the placement of the piano as inspiration for the colors and lines. The design for my piano was based on efforts to create a visual language for sound.  The piano was donated to MS 354: The School of Integrated Learning in Brooklyn.