Transcript A brief tour of Robotic Art - University of Massachusetts

A BRIEF TOUR OF ROBOTIC
ART
What is a ROBOT?
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An independent machine – they
work by themselves or by remote
control
They sense their environment –
various electronic sensors tell them
about their environment
They can be programmed – they
follow a set of instructions which
can be changed
They move, either from place to
place or they carry and handle
objects.
Robots that look like people are
called humanoid robots.
Mars rover Spirit
Paul Beck, Robots, ©2009
What is Art?- ask Kant (1724–1804)
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Immanuel Kant, “The Critique of Judgment”, discusses beauty,
aka aesthetics, (beauty!) which many people find essential to
the value of art. (This is what the manifesto writers objected to!)
Kant believed beautiful objects appear to be ‘purposive
without purpose’. An object’s purpose is the concept according
to which it was made (the concept of a vegetable soup in the
mind of the cook, for example); an object is purposive if it
appears to have such a purpose; if, in other words, it appears
to have been made or designed. But it is part of the
experience of beautiful objects, Kant argues, that they should
affect us as if they had a purpose, although no particular
purpose can be found.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
INGRES
CANOVA
Cupid and Psyche, at the Louvre
Theodor Adorno(1903-1969)
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Art has formal autonomy – an object or event that
exists on its own, has its own shape or paramenters
Art has intellectual import – “a conversation between
content and form”
Art is embedded in society as a whole; it serves a
social function
A modern definition: Art is the product or process of
deliberately arranging symbolic elements in a way that
influences and affects one or more of the senses,
emotions, and intellect.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy;
RUR
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R.U.R., often subtitled Rossum's Universal Robots in English, is
a science fiction play in the Czech language by KarelČapek.
It introduced the word “Robot” in 1921.
The play begins in a factory that makes artificial people
called "robots." Unlike the modern usage of the term, these
creatures are closer to the modern idea of androids or even
clones, as they can be mistaken for humans and can think for
themselves.
As ever when we look at robots in culture, the real questions
are, what does it mean to be human?
Being a socialist production, the robots end with a worker’s
revolution!
RUR
Early examples of Automata
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An automata is a
mechanical toy
Some life-like behavior
was modeled – card
playing, writing, drawing
Pierrot
by Vichy
Robots & Art
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Robots that make art
Artists-engineers that make robotic art
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be spending time here today: interactive
installations, robots that model animal or human
behaviors, robots designed to follow the viewer and
interact with them or behave differently when
stimulated by the viewer.
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Artists that perform with robots
Robotic art
Bill Vorn
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Hysterical Machines & Red Light - Wood
Street Galleries, Pittsburgh (USA), Apr. 22 June 19, 2011
Each Hysterical Machine has a spherical
body and eight arms made of aluminum
tubing. It has a sensing system, a motor
system and a control system that functions
as an autonomous nervous system (entirely
reactive). Some machines are suspended
from the ceiling and their arms are
actuated by pneumatic valves and
cylinders. Pyroelectric sensors allow the
robots to detect the presence of viewers in
the nearby environment. They react to the
viewers according to the amount of stimuli
they receive. The perceived emergent
behaviors of these machines engender a
multiplicity of interpretations based on
single dynamic pattern of events.
Suzi Webster
Electric Skin
Elumin8 printed LEDs, silk, sensors, breath,
electricity
This wearable, responsive garment turns
the intimate breath of the wearer into
pulses of light. The inhalation and
exhalation of the wearer activates a
breath sensor that dims and brightens the
printed LED of the garment. The wearer is
engaged in an altered state of perception,
bathed in the electric aqua light.
Electric Skin is a hybrid
object/performance that questions divisions
between ‘subject/object’ ‘inner/outer’ and
‘mind/body’ and creates an experience of
that liminal space that is neither inside nor
outside, but is a third space inbetween.
Ken Rinaldo
The artificial stomach in this
installation controls and
activates the robotic tongue.
If the bacteria within the
stomach is healthy and
reproducing, then robotic
tongue-chair senses the
presence of the
viewer/interactant reclines
and delivers a deluxe 15
minute massage. When the
interactant leaves the chair
the robot tongue returns to
an upright position.
Christian Moeller
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Mojo
Robotic Light Installation, San Pedro,
California, 2007
A robotic arm holding a theater
spotlight shines a perfect circle of light
onto the sidewalk corner of 7th and
Centre Streets. Two videocameras
attached to the roof of the building
survey the area around the sculpture
while Mojo tries to follow the passersby with his light beam.
http://www.christian-moeller.com/display.php?project_id=62&play=true
Camille Utterback
Text Rain, 1999
Text Rain is an interactive
installation in which
participants use the familiar
instrument of their bodies, to
do what seems magical—to
lift and play with falling
letters that do not really exist.
In the Text Rain installation
participants stand or move in
front of a large projection
screen. On the screen they see
a mirrored video projection of
themselves in black and white,
combined with a color
animation of falling letters.
Like rain or snow, the letters
appears to land on
participants’ heads and arms.
http://camilleutterback.com/
Paul Granjon
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2006, Heart beat
machine
Simple computercontrolled beat
machine. A padded
motorised stick hits a
piezo microphone and
produces a convincing
heart beat sound.
The heart lights-up in
sync with the beat.
Marie Sester
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Fear, 2011FEAR is a public
art work that uses a common
object as a focal point of
emotional interaction.
Situated in the middle of a
lobby, a table is illuminated
from within, surrounded by
sound producing chairs; all of
them "breathing" peacefully.
When this calming point of
attraction is approached, the
soothing light gradually
becomes aggressive and the
chairs start howling in agony.
When left alone, the objects
resume their peaceful
existence
Alan Rath
I Like To Watch,
2000
 Inspector, 1999
Steel, aluminum,
electronics,
computers,
software, LCD
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Chico Macmurtrie
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the tapered, joined cone-shapes gradually inflate with air, lengthen
and take form, eventually reaching out with a graceful wingspan,
robust with life. The Birds then begin their stationary journey with a
slow, elegant flapping motion, all 16 in a randomly generated
sequence. The pneumatic mechanism that animates the work creates
a constant, rhythmic breathing sound.
Erwin Driessens
Maria Verstappen
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Tickle is a
small
autonomous
robot: a
blank
aluminium
capsule that
is fitted with
a pair of
nubbed
rubber
caterpillar
tracks, to
give a
pleasurable
tickling skin
massage.
Jessica Field
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Tantalus, 2005
This installation is
comprised of five
electronically
networked robots
that interact with
the viewer. The
puppets are
designed to have
the goal of
attaining as much
motion as possible.
The viewer’s motion
triggers the robot's
motion, via a
motion sensor.
Jen Hall
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Instrument for Mediated
Terrain
Interactive Sculpture
Hall: co-artist
Blyth Hazen: co-artist
The electronic devices
connect the gardens and
caretake the moss; the
botany altered in a subtle
way by the viewers. The
mechanical arms activate
only when people come
close to observe. The
interaction between
technology and the moss
gardens directly depends
on these visitors.