[archive]

Robots categorized as: Performance Art

2008

Tryphon – SAILS

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tags: , , ,

Project group: SAILS -> Self-Assembling-Lighter-Than-Air-Structures

Project Name: Tryphon

Authors: Nicolas Reeves, NXI GESTATIO Design Lab, University of Quebec in Montreal.

[Project engineer : David St-Onge].

  1. Technic : The Tryphons are cubic aerobot of 2.25m side made of a carbon fiber structure. They are entirely autonomous. Equipped with a main computer brain, they can analyze data comming from many different sensors on the robots (light, ultrasounds, acceleration, compass, etc.) and after interpreting them send the appropriate commands to the motors. The robots may move freely in space, without any wire, only by the thrust of their brushless turbofans. The behaviour of the robots depends only on the programming preceding the performance and are limited only by the artist’s imagination.
  2. Art : Since the beginning of the Tryphon (and before Mascarillon) project the creators’ choose to make use of the robots for artistic purposes. One of the first objective was (and still is) to be able to assemble many of those flying cube together in space as a 3D printer able to represent in reality architecture virtual models The idea linking cubes with architecture is far more important then their use or their complex carbon fiber structure. It relies in the basic concept of viewing a non aerodynamic object floating and evolving in space without any wires or any grounded equipement. As example of other performance’s possibilities let’s mention : floating projection screen over a crowd, autonomous robots acting with simple insect-like behaviour in restricted environment (pictures of Moscow), interaction with actors in theater. The team is actually working on the last one to present next year a 4 actors – 4 robots performance in Montréal (Canada).
2007

PERCRO Body Extender

Categories: Art, Artificial Intelligence, Industrial, Military, Performance Art, Science, Transportation – Tag:

An ongoing research project of the PERCRO Perceptual Robotics Laboratory, this is a highly interdisciplinary effort involving coordination and collaboration between engineers, artists, designers and neuroscientists. The aim is to develop a sophisticated full-body robotic interface, driven by sensors capable of sensing human muscle activity and interpreted by intelligent software systems, through which the robot becomes a natural extension of the user’s body and mind.

2002

Roomba

Categories: Household, Military, Performance Art – Tags: , , ,

The Roomba is an autonomous robotic vacuum cleaner made and sold by iRobot. Under normal operating conditions, it is able to navigate a living space and its obstacles while vacuuming the floor. The Roomba was introduced in 2002; as of January 2008, over 2.5 million units have been sold.

Various hardware interface devices are available to access the Roomba using the Roomba Open Interface and some projects are described on Roomba hacking sites. In response to this activity iRobot created the iRobot Create, which is a programmable robot of similar size and shape to the Roomba. [Wikipedia]

1987

HLR – Helpless Robot

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tag:

Originally created in 1987 The Help Less robot is an interactive work that unlike most robots is essentially passive. It rotates on a large platform and it can do so only by enlisting the help of human beings, using its electronic voice.

The Helpless Robot is roughly the size of a human and is created to be an artificial personality that responds to the behavior of humans by using its electronic voice which speaks a number phrases. Which phrase is delivered is depends on its present and past experience of “emotions” ranging from boredom, frustration, arrogance, and overstimulation.

This is a classic work exploring the notion of the robot as a helpless, nothing-producing, useless machine that needs human attention. In many respects the exact opposite of what we normally think of a robot as being.

1981

Third Hand

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tags: ,

The artificial hand, attached to the right arm of the user as an addition rather than as a prosthetic replacement, is capable of independent motion, being activated by the EMG signals of the abdominal and leg muscles.

Stelarc works in a performance art context, and the Third Hand was one of his earliest robotic artworks. In the first performance with the Third Hand Stelarc used the hand to write the phrase “The Third Hand” simultaneously with his right hand and the third hand.

Since 1981 Stelarc has been creating amplified body performances in which he expands the power and reach of the human body by wiring it to electronic devices and telecommunications systems. In these performances he has combined the Third Hand with many other technological components, including sensing devices conventionally used in medicine.

1964

Robot K-456

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tags: , ,

A remote-controlled robot built to walk in the street with and playback music or recorded speech. It could also excrete beans as feces and liquid as urine.

Nam June Paik’s robot is named after a Mozart piano concerto and has the overall shape of a man, it is remote controlled and equipped with speakers allowing it to playback sound. It was built by Nam June Paik and Shuya Abe as a collaboration.

The robot was built to walk on the street and mingle with other pedestrians. In one performance Paik guided it through the streets of New York while K-456 played a recording of John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address and excreted beans at the same time.

1960

Homage to New York

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tags: ,

This was Tinguely’s first large scale self-destructing machine. It was built in the garden of the MoMA in New York with the help of engineers and other artists; among others Robert Rauschenberg. The machine performed its self-destruction program with noise and smoke for 27 minutes after which its parts lay scattered in the garden.
The thought of a machine performing such a fundamentally irrational and unproductive task as destroying itself makes a strong statement about the nature of machines and our way of linking machines and robots to rationality and productivity. This theme of the unproductive machine or robot has become a very common strategy for the artistic use of mechanics and robotics.

1958

Meta-matic no. 8

Categories: Art, Performance Art – Tags: ,

French sculptor Jean Tinguely created several of these robotlike drawing machines that preceded his infamous self-destructing machines. The Meta-matics produced drawings on paper through repeated circular motions. An element of chance was added with the inaccuracies of the machine.

The Meta-matic no. 8 takes on the role of artist and thereby can be thought of as a sarcastic statement about the role of artists.

Unlike Akira Kanayama’s Remote-control painting machine, the Meta-matic no. 8 works on its own, mindlessly creating the repetitive motions that generates the artworks.

1956

CYSP 1 – Cybernetic Spatiodynamic Sculpture

Categories: Art, Dance, Performance Art – Tags: ,

CYSP 1, from 1956, is often considered the first cybernetic sculpture in art history and also an important early example of interactive art.

The sculpture is made up by a series of colored plates and disks that move in response to external stimuli. Inside the base of the sculpture is an ‘electronic brain’ – a computer – developed by Philips.

Photo-cells and a microphone are built into the sculpture allowing it register variations in the fields of color, light intensity and sound intensity thus allowing the robot to interact with people in its near surroundings.