Yuri Engelhardt

information visualization

visual language theory

graphics and diagrams

people - planet - sustainability

About me

My academic career started with studying organic agriculture for developing countries, but I switched to medical school, and later to cognitive science.

I hold an MA degree in medicine, a Ph.D. in computer science, and I am assistant professor in media and culture, specializing in information visualization.

I am enthusiastically teaching in areas ranging from    social and environmental issues and sustainability to communication, media and graphic design.

A short biography is here (for VizThink), and another, older one, here (for the Istituto Europeo di Design).

I work at the University of Amsterdam, in the Netherlands. 

Contact me at:  yuri.engelhardt (at) gmail (dot) com

 

(with Hans Rosling)

 

New stuff - upcoming or recent

See a few of the books that mention me and my work.

Publications

Note: The Language of Graphics is out of print, but all pages have been scanned and can be downloaded via this download page. The introductory chapter (download pdf, 600 kb) deals with graphic representation, visual language, and the grammar of graphics. (See a brief review.)

Contributions to books:

Diagrams for the masses: Raising public awareness - from Neurath to Gapminder and Google Earth (with Raul Niño Zambrano). See here. In: Diagrammatic representation and inference (2008). (See first page.)

Network nations (with Ben Schouten). See here and here. In: Else/Where: Mapping New cartographies of networks and territories (2006).

Objects and spaces: The visual language of graphics. See here. In: Diagrammatic representation and inference (2006).

A meta-taxonomy for diagram research (with Alan Blackwell). See here (also here). In: Diagrammatic representation and reasoning (2002).

Grundprinzipien grafischer Darstellungen. In: Navigation durch Text, Bild und Raum (2001).

Meaningful space. In: If/Then: Design implications of new media (1999).

In press: a chapter in Diagrams of Architecture, with Alan Blackwell.

Here are some (titles of) papers I have (co-)authored (for references see Google Scholar for some of my writings):

Syntactic Structures in Graphics (pdf, 350 kB) (2007, also here).

My critical review of Edward Tufte’s Beautiful Evidence (2007).

Meaningful space: How graphics use space to convey information (1998).

A taxonomy of diagram taxonomies (1998).

Structure-preserving visualization: Towards... (1997).

Formal specification of a graphic design theory (1997).

Towards a design theory for visualization (1996).

The visual grammar of information graphics (1996).

Images:

Some images that are related to my work.

(scroll down for more)

Teaching

I have developed and taught a large number of courses at Bachelor, Master, and Research Master levels - here is a selection of recent ones:

And here are some BA courses in New Media that I have developed and taught in 2003-2006 (description in Dutch):

New media objects, Interaction design, New media analysis I, Digital culture.

Also, for many years now, I have been teaching Philosophy of science, using collaborative visualization assignments and concept mapping.

At the Utrecht Graduate School of Visual Art and Design, I am involved (since 2006) in teaching:

Information graphics in the MA program Editorial Design (also see here and here).

Many years ago, I co-taught Automatic visualization (1997) and Formal perspectives on visual representation (1996).

Programs in which I have given guest lectures include Science communication, Journalism, Graphic design, Artificial intelligence, and Human-centered multimedia.

I have (co-)developed online courses on Information visualization for the Istituto Europeo di Design (see here) and for the Open University of Catalonia, Barcelona.

Presentations

In addition to lecturing at universities, art academies and other institutions and events in the Netherlands, I’ve enjoyed traveling to give presentations in, for example, Barcelona (on The language of graphics), Berlin, Cambridge, Coventry, Edinburgh, Hamburg, Hannover, London (e.g. on Theories in information design), Paris, Pittsburgh, Recife (Brazil), Schwarzenberg (Austria), Stockholm (one-day course in Information visualization), and Stanford (e.g.: Building blocks of graphics come in syntactic categories).

Other work-related activities

Member of the Editorial Board of the Information Design Journal (and of the Advisory Committee of the Brazilian Journal of Information Design).

Founder and moderator (1995-1999) of InfoDesign and InfoDesign-Cafe, the first international electronic fora on information design (see here and here).

Assistant curator of and contributor to the InfoArcadia exhibition (1999-2000).

Recent/current memberships of program committees:

I recently participated in a (somewhat lengthy) VizThink webcast discussion about visual language and visual grammar (can also be watched here).

Together with Christian Behrens of Info Design Patterns I prepared a session on (De)-constructing Infographics for VizThink Berlin, see blog posts here and here.

Some texts that others have written about my work

Dutch media about my work:

My life

My educational path has included elementary school in Australia, high school in Germany, college in California, and university in the Netherlands. I am a (close-to-)native speaker of English, German, and Dutch. I speak French fluently, and I am enthusiastically working on my Spanish.

Early non-academic work experience:

Among other jobs, I’ve been a teaching assistant in a school for physically handicapped children, as a medical student I have worked in health care in various medical centers and hospitals (general practice, psychology, orthopedics, surgery), and I’ve been an infographics-developer for popular science journals.

I have always been active for sustainable development and for international social responsibility (e.g. during the 2006 flooding in Surinam, I happened to be in Paramaribo, so I helped to coordinate international aid). 

I am currently a curriculum-co-developer and member of the teaching staff for Future Planet Studies (short descriptions here and here, plus the detailed program - all in Dutch). Future Planet Studies is a new BA program that combines natural sciences and social sciences to study possibilities for sustainable development, focusing on people as well as on the planet .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love The Story of Stuff.