11/7/2003
Robot
Eyebeam, New York
Eyebeam will host ROBOT, a four-day festival featuring a robotic talent show, exhibition, workshops, presentations, party and massage parlor.
Eyebeam will host ROBOT, a four-day festival featuring a robotic talent show, exhibition, workshops, presentations, party and massage parlor. The four-day event will examine current applications of robotic technologies on creative practices, activism, consumerism and physical intimacy. Eyebeam will conclude the event July 15 with a party from 6-10pm featuring music by DJ-I ROBOT, the first random-access, fully analog robotic DJ. All events are open to the public free of charge with a suggested donation.
Tickle Salon - Eyebeam is pleased to host the U.S. premiere of the Tickle Salon at ROBOT. The Tickle Salon, by Dutch artists Erwin Driessens and Maria Verstappen, is a robotic installation based on the concept of automated stroking. The massaging machine is designed to stroke with indefatigable attention and subtleness, uniting the artists' interests in "meta creativity, biology and artificial intelligence, and of course the pleasure of being stroked." The Tickle Salon will be in operation throughout the run of ROBOT and attendees will be able to enjoy a private massage on a first-come, first-serve basis.
Saturday and Sunday, July 12 -13
12-6 pm Tickle Salon
12-6 pm Artbots
ArtBots: The Robot Talent Show
Featuring the work of 23 artists and groups from six countries, the show is a hybrid combining aspects of both a juried art exhibition and a traditional talent show. Participants include robots that draw, paint, sculpt, sing, dance, and play musical instruments, as well as many with talents that are a bit harder to pin down; you might call them robotic sculpture or even cybernetic performance artists! In keeping with the "Robot Talent Show" theme, attendees will be invited to vote for their favorite ArtBot. Two awards will be presented at the end of the show: The Audience Choice Award and The Robot's Choice Award (artists vote for their favorite ArtBots). Artbots is curated and produced this year by Douglas Repetto, Philip Galanter, and Jenny Lee and selected works from the competition will remain installed at Eyebeam during the remainder of the ROBOT festival. For more information on Artbots and a list of participating artists and their projects please visit http://www.artbots.org/2003.
Monday, July 14
12-6pm - Tickle Salon and exhibition on view
6-8pm - Robot workshops
Mindstorms Workshop - This workshop, intended for ages 12 and up, will teach participants of all ages how to build and program their own robots using LEGO Mindstorms (small computers with programmable behaviors) in order to address a specific challenge. Participants will work with an artist to learn the Mindstorm programming language, experiment with the design of a physical computing project, and test the results in their own mini-robot "runway show".
Feral Robotic Dogs - The Bureau of Inverse Technology will lead a workshop on building feral robotic dogs. These semi-autonomous activist robots are created by disassembling and rebuilding commercially available robotic toy dogs. The toys are 'upgraded' by installing a new nose (data collection sensors), a new brain that programs the dogs to "sniff out" contaminants in the environment and by mechanically improving them so that they can traverse outdoor terrain.
Tuesday July 15
12-6pm - Tickle Salon
12-6pm - New York - Tokyo Robotics
6-8pm - Presentations and Discussion
8-10 - Party
New York - Tokyo presents the latest robot technologies commercially available in Japan including pet robots, entertainment robots, toy robots, labor robots, and even caretaker robots. Join us to interact with the robots and view demonstrations throughout the day.
Presentations Please join Eyebeam's Director of R&D, Jonah Peretti, for a panel discussion and series of presentations examining ways in which artificial intelligence impacts contemporary society and creative practice. Participants will include Artbots director Douglas Repetto, Natalie Jeremijenko from the Bureau of Inverse Technology, Tickle Salon creators Erwin Driessens and Maria Verstappen, Chico MacMurtrie of Amorphic Robot Works and Chris Csikszentmihalyi of the MIT Media Lab.
Party Immediately following the presentations a performance by Csikszentmihalyi's amazing robotic DJ-I ROBOT will kick off a party celebrating the event.
ROBOT is Eyebeam's second summer event combining exhibitions, demonstrations and workshops intended to encourage audience participation, open discourse and creative practice with technology and the arts. We Love New York: Mapping Manhattan with Artists and Activists, held in August 2002, examined wireless and surveillance technologies which pervade public spaces. We Love New York featured the worldwide launch of the wireless game Noderunner, recent recipient of the 2003 Ars Electronica Golden Nica Award.
Eyebeam
540 W. 21st Street
New York
tel. 212-252-5193
Fax: 718.222.5621