The rapid global growth of data centers — enormous digital processing facilities that constitute the material infrastructure behind “cloud computing” and artificial intelligence — during the early twenty-first century, has produced a variety of ecological and environmental justice problems resulting from their voracious consumption of energy, water, and land, as well as their generation of substantial noise, air pollution, and concerns about economic inequity in adjacent local communities. With more than 500 data centers built and projected, the Commonwealth of Virginia has been called “Data Center Alley” — a nickname recalling the notorious “Cancer Alley” of petrochemical facilities in Louisiana. This gallery highlights works of art that challenge the ethereal promotional discourse of “cloud computing” by highlighting the substantial ecological and material realities of data centers while probing their broader aesthetic and social implications.
