Robotic art is a broad term that encompasses a variety of sub-types of art, all of which employ some form of robotic or automated technology.
Robotic installation art unifies Installation art and robotic technologies insofar as the works and installations often employ computers, sensors, actuators and programming which allow them to respond or evolve in relation to viewer interactions. In this kind of art and technology-based work the viewer is transformed from a passive viewer to an active participant. One significant way in which this work can differ from kinetic art is that it is usually non-programmatic in the sense that the future behavior of the sculpture or installation can be altered by input from either the artist or the participant.
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The history and evolution of robotic art and theater is quite involved. Early progenitors start in Ancient China (Han Dynasty, c. third century B.C.), with the development of a mechanical orchestra, and other devices such as mechanical toys. These last included flying automatons, mechanized doves and fish, angels and dragons, and automated cup-bearers, all hydraulically actuated for the amusement of Emperors by anonymous engineer-craftspeople. Several names have come down to us, however. Mo Ti and the artificer Yen Chin are said to have created automated chariots.[1] By the time of the Sui Dynasty (6'th Century A.D.), a compendium was written called the Shai Shih t'u Ching, or 'Book of Hydraulic Excellencies'. There are reports that the T'ang Dynasty saw Chinese engineers building mechanical birds, otters that swallowed fish, and monks begging girls to sing.
In Ancient Rome in the time of Nero the great poet and novelist Petronius made a “doll that moved”, and around c. 85 A.D. there were the amazing writings and creations of Hero of Alexandria, who wrote "On Automatic Theaters, On Pneumatics, and on Mechanics", and is said to have built fully automated theatrical set-pieces illustrating the labors of Hercules among other wonders.
In the 13th century AD Badi Al-Zaman'Isma'il Al-Razzaz Al-Jazari was a Muslim inventor who devoted himself to mechanical engineering. Like Hero, he experimented with water clock and other hydraulic mechanisms.[2] Al-Jaziri’s life's work culminated in a book which he called “The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices,” completed in 1206 AD. This book is often known simply as “Automata.” In Europe in the 13th century Villard de Honnecourt is known to have built mechanical angels for the French court, and in the 15th century Johannes Muller built both a working mechanical Eagle and a Fly.
In the Middle Ages in Europe, clockmakers built an astronomical Clock in Prague. On the hour, a skeleton with an hourglass in his hand rings a bell, and then a Turk draws his sword. Finally a series of animatronic figures move across the top of the clock.
As the industrial revolution grew a new sub-genre of literature addressing the anxieties of the age appeared. Many of these writings featured a mechanical humanoid as a central character. Some of these artificial men in literature included:
and in the early 20th century:
and even later in the 20th century:
Advances in engineering created new possibilities. In 1893 Prof. George Moore created 'The Steam Man', a steam-powered robot in New York City which reportedly pulled a wagon-load of musicians in a parade. Rumour has it that parts from this Steam Man appeared in junk shops around Manhattan a few years later.
The revolutionary work of Nikola Tesla, is an example. In 1898 Tesla demonstrated a remote-controlled robotic submarine in Madison Square Garden. Tesla described this historic vehicle as having "a borrowed mind. When first shown... it created a sensation such as no other invention of mine has ever produced."[3]
Robotics have now become a mode of expression for artists confronting fundamental issues and contradictions in our advanced industrial culture.
Robotic performance art refers to the presentation of theatrical performances in which most, if not all, of the "action" is executed by robots rather than by people. An early robotic artist was Edward Ihnatowicz, who created The Senster (1969–71). It employed sound sensors and hydraulics, which reacted to visitors in the space. Shows of this sort are sometimes large and elaborate productions. The Swiss sculptor Jean Tinguely (1925–1991) created kinetic sculptures usually made from industrial junk. They were hallucinatory and fabulous machines which performed unpredictably until they inevitably met a tragic fate, which was often to self-destruct. He constructed his 'Homage to New York' in the sculpture garden of the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1960. This 23-foot-high (7.0 m) and 27-foot-long (8.2 m) mechanism performed, then self-destructed as planned in an epic and heroic manner.
Due in part to the many variables and complications associated with the production of performances of this kind, they have historically been just as likely to be "underground" affairs as officially sanctioned events. San Francisco's Survival Research Laboratories is considered to be the pioneer of the 'spectacle' form of underground robotic art.
David Karave's robotics and fire artwork, Home Automation[4], is an animatronic theatre performance, with themes of propaganda and peace. This robotic artwork was created over 3 years, by more than 30 artists in the USA and Canada. The project has toured across the United States, and was shown at the Tennessee Bonnaroo festival with A.S.S. The Art of Such N Such, to a crowd of approximately 80,000[5] giving the show perhaps the largest singular audience in the history of robotic art. In 'Home Automation' a family of lifesize aluminum animatronic crash test dummies musically self-destruct, as they watch color code threat alerts on their projected home TV. The robot family's heads finally ignite into circuit breaking flames.
Two San Francisco-based performance ensembles, Frank Garvey's Omnicircus and Chico MacMurtrie's Amorphic Robot Works, were among the first expressions of integrated robotic music-theatrical performance, with human actors, dancers and musicians joining the mechanical performers (Amorphic later moved to NYC).
The Robotic Ensemble of the OmniCircus is a robot red-light district, a life-sized troupe of mechanical beggars, hookers, junkies and street-preachers who appear in OmniCircus stage shows and movies and engage in cyborg guerilla theater on the city streets. The San Francisco Bay Area has been the home and/or origin of many other mechanical performance ensembles and artists, including Matt Heckert's Mechanical Sound Orchestra, Kal Spelletich's Seemen, Carl Pisaturo, and Alan Rath, making the SF Bay Area a nexus of robotic art.
This is a list of contemporary robotics artists.
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