Place/Dates: Graz – February 16-22, 2009

Description:

Robotic Ensemble Concert and Installation

Robotic instruments are placed in different places over the network. Each instrument has a sensory set-up in parallel to capture the audio, and/or any other generative source for data. Data is delivered to the other places and interpreted by the possibilities of the robotic instrument either directly or in interaction with the data. Each place has a different sound context and character, the correspondence between data and how it varies depends on the characteristics of the sender and receiver (e.g.: automatic piano player, drum-android, …) The instruments should be constructed or adapted in a development process before, with the focus on the network performance, either in the form of an installation or a concert.

Five Media artists from Austria and abroad, are invited to apply for a two-month arts research residency at the MedienKunstLabor im Kunsthaus Graz, between July and September 2009. The deadline for applications was Friday the 1st of May 2009.

Objective:

First residencies for robotics in performance art was to be to be done in order to develop robots from the artistic point of view. A focused strategy for controlling and the behavior of specific types of robots was to be done.

Results:

From the applicants, five persons were selected representing different approaches to robotics. In a first workshop the different approaches were discussed and a sample implementation was worked on. As a result, an installation wsa created in order to represent the different approaches and cultures within a network. “Social Machines” was chosen by the artists as the title of the exhibition.

Products (if appropriate):

Art Installation within the Medienkunstlabor in the Kunsthaus Graz.

Target group:

Robot artists, technicians and visitors.

Number of participants/visitors/audience :

• Five Artists in residence, 2 technicians for assistance, 1 curator.

• About 500 visitors during exhibition of 1 week.