Methodological approach 

As we highlight in our article on arts-based research in journalism studies (Hölsgens, de Wildt and Witschge, 2020), arts-based approaches allow us, at the same time, to elicit, challenge but also intimate journalism’s complexity in a time that the field is in flux. We highlight the participatory nature of arts-based research methodologies allowing ‘for a bottom-up understanding of the journalistic profession’ (Hölsgens, de Wildt and Witschge, 2020, 932). 

Particularly relevant for this exposition is that arts-based research methods focus on experiences, as they draw attention ‘to the sensual, tactile, and unsaid’ (Springgay, Irwin, and Kind, 2005, 899). And, as we aim to do here, arts-based research aims to function as an invitation towards interpretation (Shields and Penn, 2016, 9). We aim to draw on the 'expansive potential of aesthetic experience and experiential knowledge' (Sniadecki, 2014, 26) and, in doing so, invite 'the viewer/audience to participate in the interpretive processes' (Shields and Penn 2016, 9). In this exposition, we use sensory walk, video, artwork, and a sensory map as means towards this. 

Sensory walk

Inspired by Degen and Rose’s (2012) ‘walk-alongs,’ we understand a sensory walk as encouraging participants to articulate how they engage with a space by focusing on texture, sight, smell, thermal experience, and auditory stimulations. Although there is an extensive body of literature on the practice of walking, we are mostly interested in a few specific components in this: the relationship between bodily movement and the formation of knowledge, as well as the configuration of atmospheres. 

We have likened this to the process of ‘wayfaring’ (Ingold, 2010). By focusing on Alfred’s sensory accounts, we created an opportunity to intimate these relationships through a ‘sideways and detached’ perception (Merleau-Ponty, 2002 p.12) of the environment – in this case, the newsroom. Rather than Alfred presenting the newsroom to us from his rationalized understanding of this – for-him-familiar work environment – the sensory walk made it possible for Alfred to rediscover the newsroom together with us.

Video

We started by filming establishing shots, not only to record spatial outlines and details but also to affectively attune ourselves and our bodies to the newsroom’s atmospheres. These initial video recordings reflect our wider approach in that we predominantly engaged with the people, things, and movements we were affectively drawn to during our research visits (see also Ottersland Myhre et al., 2017). These video recordings, and by extension, this exposition, therefore, point towards our own positionality, that is, how our physical presence and research strategies intersect with the newsroom’s atmospheres. 

In so doing, we explicitly position ourselves and our bodies within the newsroom’s spatial configuration, recognising that our presence might affect how it is experienced, perceived, and represented. Brinkmann (2014) calls this ‘stumble data,’ as we, as researchers, stumble upon things that triggered our interest and followed that up along the day (see also Ottersland Myhre et al., 2017).

Video, for us, offers a medium through which to research such stumble data, including sensory, affective, and empathetic forms of engagement: video is a 'technique, technology and practical activity through which to research in and through atmospheres. If we are in our environments, and (…) atmosphere is experienced from the inside, video recordings are likewise made in environments, not of them’ (Pink, Mackley and Morosanu, 2015, p.355). Throughout this exposition, we employ video recordings as a means of gesturing towards the kind of ‘traces’ that make and remake atmospheres.

Artistic drawing

In addition to our positionality and to optimally employ the artistic view, we invited visual artist Ricky Booms to join us in the newsroom. We invited Ricky to visit the newsroom for a day and commissioned him to make an artwork based on his observations in and of the space. The specific request that was put to this artist was: ‘reflect on the newsroom’s spatial surrounding, interactions and/or work practices (…) This can be as creative, experimental and reflective as you’d like.’ 

Ricky arrived shortly after we finished our sensory walk. We introduced ourselves to Ricky, after which he started his own inquiry into the newsroom. Throughout the day, we spoke a couple of times, without sharing our findings in great detail. After the research visit, Ricky made an artwork in his home studio. During the day in the newsroom, Ricky initially started with counting objects, finding patterns, and documenting the newsroom’s structure. Identifying the (open) office space of the online news section as the heart of the newsroom, he slowly and systematically worked his way outward towards a more multi-layered and personalised reflection, getting lost and locked out of the building multiple times in this process. Eventually, he made an artwork that he himself refers to as a ‘layered map,’ ‘which isn’t perfect, and not exactly how things are, but it does offer (…) an overview. Yes, it is literally a map.’

When the artwork was made, Tamilla Ziyatdinova (working as a researcher on the project) met him in his home studio for a follow-up interview to discuss his impressions, working methods and choices made. We also presented the artwork to the publication’s chief editor and online news editor for feedback. The artwork aimed at further eliciting reflections from those inhabiting the workspace, which indeed occurred when we presented it in the newsroom to the editors.

Exposition and sensory chart

Over the course of this project, we had internal discussions on how to best represent our findings. We decided to commit to an overview that visualises how the online news editor ‘wayfares’ through his workplace. The overview aspires to move beyond a direct representation of physical space by including aspects of lived experience, such as sensory perception, movements, encounters, and in our case, atmospheres. By including video material, soundscapes, interviews, text, and graphics, we develop a navigational nerve centre that functions as an ‘open invitation’ for the reader to wayfare through our exposition – and, by extension, the newsroom per se. With this, we aim to provide an opportunity for the reader to engage with our research project in non-linear ways. 

By structuring our deep map around the sensory walk, we were able to make certain observations that might exceed the capacity of semi-structured interviews. For instance, the deep map reveals that the news editor experiences the newsroom as though it had multiple, clearly demarcated, and outlined sections. This is surprising because it contradicts the narrative of the open space as the principal characteristic of the newsroom. Within the deep map, we explore these sections in more detail, including his everyday engagements with these experientially marked-off areas.

One prominent aspect of our deep map is a sensory notation radar chart, drawing on the work of Raymond Lucas (2015) to represent how we experience space. Specifically, the chart visualises the six most commonly defined perceptual systems senses – from the auditory system to kinesthetics – and provides a visual indication of how the online news editor relates to specific sections of the newsroom regarding his sensory perception. 

Based on the sensory walk, we plotted which of the senses appeared to be most important for the editor, highlighting how we can identify multiple atmospheres in the open space newsroom, as perceived and – as we indicate below – created by Alfred. Alongside video recordings, Ricky’s artistic drawings, and the deep map as such, these radar-like sensory charts tease out the multiplicity of experiences and representations of the newsroom.