BARCELONA, SPAIN Big Data Urbanization

How Big Data was used to coin Urbanism in 1867 and how today every city is trying to make art out of it. This exhibition presents the first General Theory of Urbanization, written in 1867 in Barcelona by Ildefonso Cerda, together with new digital systems that allow for analyzing, managing, and projecting data and information systems. In his General Theory of Urbanization, which has now been translated for the first time into English, Cerda coined the concept of urbanism, as the science to reform and expand cities. And for this, he studied disciplines such as statistics, hygienism, law, economics, architecture, and religion. In its second volume, he analyzed the city of Barcelona using statistics and data in order to demonstrate that people’s living conditions were not adequate. Thus a new urban model had to be invented. Now, with the general theory translated into English, the statistical pages visualized through graphics and maps, making them compressible create the first representation of nineteenth-century urban big data. Cerda invented the concept of urbanism and also pointed out the need to use information and data to understand cities better. Coinciding with the 150th anniversary of this important project, and amid a digital revolution where multiple initiatives in cities around the world are aiming to represent the functioning of cities through data, the work presents his vision into a reality. The selection of work presented includes map projects used for urban analytical maps, city management, participatory processes, business platforms, or open
data systems from around the world. In Barcelona, capital of Catalonia, modern urbanism was invented. Now, we work to build better cities and territories to make a more livable world.