5000times

Think about the commercials or advertisements you see for the newest phone or laptop. How often do you see the people – other than the designers – who make them?

In 5000times, designer Kiki Mager investigates the invisible forms of labor involved in the production of smartphones, tablets, and laptops. Using video footage taken inside manufacturing facilities, Mager deconstructed the hand movements that workers perform thousands of times a day during the assembly process, and recreated a similar choreography in the animated video of 5000times.

The sculptures beside the video capture how often one task will be performed in one day by one person employed in smart high-tech manufacturing: 2,160 solder drops for soldering pieces together; 3,927 pieces of Kapton tape usually placed on inner components, and 2,541 pieces of foil for screen protection. The quantity of work becomes visible in the stacks of materials, which would usually be spread out across thousands of devices.