ArtBots - The Robot Talent Show

ArtBots writes "Speaking of guitar playing robots... ArtBots: The Robot Talent Show is next weekend in Dublin. We've had musical robots in the past (including Lemur), but this year's show focuses more on robotic sculpture and installation. Slashdotters in Eire -- come say hello!" From the site: "Featuring 21 works selected from a large and diverse pool of entries submitted by artists from around the world, the show celebrates the strange and wonderful collision of shifty artists, disgraced engineers, high/low/no tech hackers, rogue scientists, beauty school dropouts, backyard pyros, and industrial spys that has come to define the emerging field of robotic art."

Comments

Robots used in art

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Robots are more and more leaving production lines and work duties (hence the name Robot, from "rabota", meaning "work" in russian) and getting into the field of art. It's great news because truly novel works can be created with them (not by them yet IMHO, mind you...).

Here's a great theatrical performance from swiss actors and engineers, that involve 2 human actors and 3 robots that have been program to interact in complex ways with the actors. The play is very surprising, as everything "clicks" together just as if the robots were truly alive and acting.

Re:Robots used in art

[Hektor_Troy]

(hence the name Robot, from "rabota", meaning "work" in russian)

Not quite.

Robot is a word that is both a coinage by an individual person and a borrowing. It has been in English since 1923 when the Czech writer Karel apek's play R.U.R. was translated into English and presented in London and New York. R.U.R., published in 1921, is an abbreviation of Rossum's Universal Robots; robot itself comes from Czech robota, servitude, forced labor, from rab, slave. The Slavic root behind robota is orb, from the Indo-European root *orbh, referring to separation from one's group or passing out of one sphere of ownership into another. This seems to be the sense that binds together its somewhat diverse group of derivatives, which includes Greek orphanos, orphan, Latin orbus, orphaned, and German Erbe, inheritance, in addition to the Slavic word for slave mentioned above. Czech robota is also similar to another German derivative of this root, namely Arbeit, work (its Middle High German form arabeit is even more like the Czech word). Arbeit may be descended from a word that meant slave labor, and later generalized to just labor. (From Answers.com)

But close.

Re:Robots used in art

[roman_mir]

Czech writer Karel apek's play R.U.R. - only it's Karel Capek

I remember watching the old movie R.U.R., that was pretty funny - the robot workers at the factories taking over human positions and then even revolting against the humans. The proto-proto-terminators :)

---
B.T.W., an old anekdote (an association from the German 'arbaiten'):

the German version of the cuckoo's clock:
the bird comes out every 15 minutes and shouts:
-Arbeiten und Disziplinen!

Will the concept of art be ruined by creations

[Seiruu]

made by soulless beings? I never did get much into the whole art thing. Chimps that paint, elephants that paint etc. I don't think this will be appreciated by the so called "real" artists.

Re:Will the concept of art be ruined by creations

[Anonymous Coward]

The way I see it, art is the act, not the result of the act. Paintings and songs are just things that may or may not evoke an emotional response.

Re:Will the concept of art be ruined by creations

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, you think the real art is the act of painting or recording/writing a song?

I like that theory. Cheers, mate.

Re:Will the concept of art be ruined by creations

[teknoartist]

(We) The particiapants of Artbots are "real artists." As everything on this planet changes, so too must art evolve to reflect current cultural situations. Robotics in art a new concept...... much like Duchamps' ready made works at the turn of the last century, many did not understand nor call it art until, they understood the language of the (then) current movement and evolution of art. ~best to all, John, http;//www.teknoarts.com PS. while I was intiitally accepted to this juried only exhibit, I had to back out a few weeks ago because of major health issues. I wish Artbots a very successful show. "SALIX" and I will be there is spirit!

Re:Will the concept of art be ruined by creations

[rbarreira]

It hasn't even been proved that we have a soul. For all we know, our feeling of "having a soul" is just a side-effect of our brain's activity. What matters is that were sentient.

Any Artbot people coming to What The Hack?

[HannoLiem]

What The Hack is the latest edition of the one of the oldest and largest outdoor hacker festivals in the Netherlands. I would LOVE to have some of the ArtBot people and bots from this event coming to WTH - we start building only a week later, so if you are around... Check out What The Wiki and the program for the latest...

Actually I take that back

[Seiruu]

When a robot starts spraying everything dark blue, you will definitely know it's experiencing some serious drama and pain... .......and that's it's running on a windows OS.

Theme

[gunpowda]

Heh, the show comes complete with its own theme tune.

Lyrics transcribed for your enjoyment: Artbots, Artbots [Indistinct robotic mumbling] Artbots.

Im Irish, Im in Dublin !

[dublinclontarf]

Finaly something happening here while im actually here, & and free!

I for one... ;-)

[TERdON]

welcome our new art-producing overlords!

And at 2:14 AM the ArtBots Become Self-Aware...

[Evil W1zard]

By the time the ArtBots became self-aware they had spread into millions of museums across the planet. Ordinary robots in office buildings, dorm rooms; everywhere. It was software; in cyberspace. There was no system core; it could not be shutdown. The attack began at 6:18 PM, just as he said it would. Judgment Day, the day human art was almost destroyed by the ArtBots they'd built to paint themselves. I should have realized it was never our destiny to stop Judgment Day, it was merely to survive it, together.

Robotic guitar? How about robotic groupies?

[Twixter]

Here they put all this effort into a robotic guitar player with 23 fingers....Where the hell are the robotic groupies? Thats what I wanna know. Will they come with their own STD testing kit? It wouldn't take 23 fingers thats for sure...just a vacume and lots of silly one liners like "You were great." and "Can I hold your guitar?" And in the worst case scenario if it has a stalking feature...it will be alot easier to explain to your girlfriend. Todd Edman Android Ethic (Yes, thats really the band name.) http://androidethic.com/

Re:Robotic guitar? How about robotic groupies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Groupies suck. Groupies are are just vampire lesbians who want a fucking sugar daddy.

I get groupies after me and I'm not even that good. They think I'm a rock star because I do loud public musical performances. It's weird; something about being on a stage three and a half feet higher than the audience, doing something "musical" or "artsy," and they think you're special. Fuck groupies. Fuck the public.

There. Now I'm going to get all artsy and "brood" someplace.

Re:Robotic guitar? How about robotic groupies?

[Twixter]

See, all the more reason for a robotic one. They are even less picky than the real ones. Spreads the love around to the hair metal bands that just will not die.

Todd Edman
Android Ethic http://androidethic.com/

Yeah... I hv heard it. Shit happens

[Anonymous Coward]

Two friends meet in the office of one of them, a notorious techno-geek.

"Hey, bud, how are ya?"

"I'm good. Congratulations, that new secretary of yours is beautiful!"

"Well, I'm glad you like her. Believe it or not, she's a robot!"

"No way, how could that be?"

"Way! She's the latest model from Japan. Lemme tell you how she works. If you squeeze her left tit, she takes dictation. If you squeeze her right tit, she types a letter. And that's not all, she can have sex, too!"

"Holy shit! You're kidding, right?"

"No, she's something, huh? Tell you what, you can even borrow her."

So, his friend takes her into the restroom and is in there with her for a while. Suddenly, he hears him screaming "Eeeeyaaaaa! Heeelp" Ooooooh! Aaaaaaah! eeeeeeeeeaaargghhhh!"

The guy says, "Shit! I forgot to tell him her ass is a pencil sharpener!"

Re:Yeah... I hv heard it. Shit happens

[dabigpaybackski]

And her vagina dispenses vanilla ice cream.

offtopic

[Anonymous Coward]

offtopic

Dispell a myth, and make a categorization

[tod_miller]

Firstly, Art has been made from automated 'mechanisms' before, so unless the art is PROGRAMMATICALLY and controlled in its development (be it sculpture or canvas) then it cannot be said to be intelligent, or robotic design. Merely mechnical design.

Now, that out of the way (we can piss on the graves of all the assholes with a set of beating whips and a can of paint) there is a second idea:

Art is, literally, effort, a work of some kind. Aesthetics and various genres complicate things. But each piece of art (forget photography for a moment, although that is a valid art form, the art is setting the scene, the technique is pushing the button with the right settings) is an interpretation. NOT PERFECTION as some uneducated people think (perfection to an idea, not photorealism).

So, for a piece of art to be 'robotic' then there must be an interpretation between a concept, and execution of that concept, and the ability of the machine to correct, and evolve the piece based on the way it can percieve some data that represents the idea, or even create a new idea based on an input, such as a visual stimulus.

Then a robot could, with limited boundaries of comprehension (in terms of what is programmed) capture a visual stimulus, and use it to generate a representation, or merely add it to the cake mix of their mad idea.

Anything that is basically a macro, supplied to a mechnical device, is wrong. EVEN IF THE MACRO is a randomised type 'random art' or computer generated art.

So, taking 'computer generated art' and sending it to, basically, a complex pringting device is NOT ROBOTIC ART.

I will be very suprised if 1 piece of robotic art is truly robotic art in the next 5 years. (or ever, depending on your definition)

Re:Dispell a myth, and make a categorization

[Corvus9]

So, taking 'computer generated art' and sending it to, basically, a complex printing device is NOT ROBOTIC ART.

Most of the Artbots are pieces of art themselves, not printing devices. But there are others that actually create art; Shockbot creates new images using influences from its environment, RoboZoic is a performance piece.

Neither of these works are preprogrammed, and both "evolve the piece based on the way it can percieve some data ...".

Ignore me mod down, I should RTFA

[tod_miller]

It was about making cute looking robots, not cute looking robots making art.

I suck. Move along, nothing to see.

Re:Ignore me mod down, I should RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm. Who sucks more: you, who didn't RTFA, or the moderators, who didn't RTFA either yet modded you Insightful?

MIT Museum Art Machines

[schwal]

My personal favorate among "robotic" art is Machine With Oil by Aurthur Ganson. It can be seen at The MIT Museum

Just a bit presumptuous...

[absurdist]

Demonstrate to me that chimps, elephants, and so on don't have souls.

For that matter, demonstrate to me that humans do have souls. And no, I don't consider any religious book to be a valid reference.

Then we'll talk.

Re:Just a bit presumptuous...

[Seiruu]

Souls are usually referred to as the core, or body that can "feel" mentally, ie emotion.

While I have no doubt that animals have said "souls"; like parental love, art is not just about the act but also the "emotion" or "sphere" attached to said actions/results.

In other words, the expression of one's emotions through the actions is what I qualify as art. And with "art", I'm more referring to the "paintings" that seem gibberish to most people in this case.

Question is, what exactly can be identified by an elephant that seems to be randomly spraying paint over a painting? Is there emotion? Is there a story? Is there something attached to that piece of art that can make it "art"? Who'd ever know?

The Mona Lisa, in all its glory, is simply an oil painting of a woman sitting on some rocks looking at the painter. In the world, there are thousands just like that. It was made famous because people simply associated certain feelings, emotions to it and it took off from there.

To me, said art is simply bullshit, but for the so called "real" artists, art needs to have a certain meaning before it can truly be considered art.

Art is Art

[John Nowak]

If someone calls something art, you have to consider it art. Period. All this other nonsense debating what is and isn't art is coming from non-artists or hacks trying to put an objective view on everything. If someone says something is art, you have to treat it as such. You may think it is shitty art, and it probably is, but it is still art. That said, I went to ArtBots last year in Harlem, and it was great. I defy anyone who was actually there to say that there was not a lot of beautiful "art" present.

Captured! by Robots

[skazatmebaby]

If anyone likes music making robotics, check out, Captured! by Robots the next time the tour your favorite Dive-Bar-With-a-Stage

Five Stars.

LOL@Cockroach-Controlled.Mobile.Robot

[v3xt0r]

wtf?

http://artbots.org/2005/participants/Cockroachcont rolled/

LOL!

Good...

[rbarreira]

This is great, I just hope that money is used well by the government :)

Oops, fucking wrong story, sorry :(

[rbarreira]

See subject... and sorry.