Kudos coloring workshop
This workshop invites kids and adults to explore the creative and critical potential of GPS technology through drawing and coloring.
Inspired by KUDOS – Coloring Book, the session includes two main activities. At one station, participants can color in playful shapes taken from the book. At another station, participants will be invited to look closely at the street layout of Basel and imagine their own figurative shapes, a bit like finding animals or faces in the clouds.
The drawings featured in KUDOS – Coloring Book are based on real GPS art created by users of the fitness app Strava. Strava allows people to track their running or cycling routes and share them online, where other users can give them “kudos” (similar to likes on other social media platforms). Over time, some users began creatively planning their routes to produce figurative drawings on the map.
Each year, Strava publishes a global heatmap showing the most popular routes worldwide. In 2018, users noticed patterns on the map that accidentally revealed military activity in remote areas. While some participants were simply enjoying the creativity of GPS drawing, the soldiers unknowingly exposed sensitive information.
In 2024, journalists at Le Monde revisited this topic, revealing that even more sensitive data was being unintentionally disclosed. By analyzing the movement data of bodyguards using the fitness app, reporters were able to pinpoint the locations of world leaders like Vladimir Putin, Joe Biden, and Emmanuel Macron during diplomatic visits. What began as recreational tracking had become a tool to reveal the movement of power itself.
KUDOS – Coloring Book is both a tribute to these unexpected digital artists and a gentle invitation to think about how visible and traceable our movements really are. The KUDOS workshop will be a space to playfully explore how familiar tools can be used in unfamiliar ways and how a simple act like drawing can open up space to question, reflect, and imagine new futures.
