Numbers and Art Have Always Intertwined

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As a kid, I would draw all the time and I think I very quickly understood also from some parental nudges that that was not a serious career. My mum said, you know, it's really, really artistic. And she was like becoming a plastic surgeon. Hello. The most artistic of doctors. So yeah, I just understood that wasn't serious. But in some ways that also is the place where art and numbers really do intersect, right? Like every artist, even the ones who hate data and don't think of themselves as numbers people at all, everyone has to figure out how he or she can make it come together each month.

Whenever we have a question – about ourselves or the world around us – it can be helpful to visualize our answer in order to really understand it. But how do you conceptualize something as big as inequality, as complex as grief, or as silly as your probability of correctly guessing today’s Wordle? For data journalist Mona Chalabi, the answer is through data – and drawing. You’ve probably seen Mona’s illustrations on the internet. She’s known for interpreting data in a way that makes you GET it. In today’s episode, she explains how anyone could use analysis to answer their most personal questions – from whether or not to have a breakup to how many friends you should have. For the text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts