His work is a product of a personal experience he had with the U.S. government while trying to reenter the United States from Africa. He had been placed on the no-fly list and was detained in an INS detention facility and questioned for months regarding his activities before and after September 11, 2001 in the United States and abroad. Elahi’s work has him traveling to countries all over the world. In fact, there are probably very few countries in the world that are not stamped inside his passport. Even after months of questioning, he still had to let the FBI know when he was leaving the country, where he was going, and how long he’d be gone so that they could clear him in any airports he might pass through. Unfortunately for Elahi, he was never officially charged or accused of anything so he could never officially be cleared.

From this experience, Elahi decided that he could keep track and report on his activities much better than anyone from the government. From this, trackingtranscience.net was born. His website now documents his location (from his cellphone), images of the food he eats, urinals he uses and other data that is pertinent to disclosing his whereabouts and activities including phone records and bank statements, each one showing time-stamped phone calls and debit card purchases in cities all over the world.

Elahi has worked with museums and other exhibitors to create art pieces using the data he collects. One such art piece included a display of emergency procedures and routes for airplanes. For more on Elahi, visit his website at http://elahi.sjsu.edu/ and trackingtranscience.net

Above: Elahi’s position as of Wednesday, April 1, 2009 at 11:47am as reported from his website, trackingtranscience.net.