But if they make too many mistakes Deltu might just get upset and decide to ignore them. Frustrated, Deltu will leave the game and take some selfies to post on Instagram.

Credits

Supported by ECAL, École cantonale d’art de Lausanne

Archive Dreaming, which was first presented at SALT Galata, is user-driven; however, when idle, the installation “dreams” of unexpected correlations among documents.

In this project, a temporary architectural space is created as a blank slate for light and data to be applied as materials that form a volume of an archive visualized with machine intelligence. By training a neural network with images of documents, Archive Dreaming reframes memory, history and culture within the understanding of a museum for the 21st century.

Credits

As part of the five-year program The Uses of Art—The Legacy of 1848 and 1989, organized by L’Internationale, Archive Dreaming was realized with the support of Google’s AMI program.

SALT Research and programs: Vasıf Kortun, Meriç Öner, Cem Yıldız, Adem Ayaz, Başak Çaka, Merve Elveren, Ari Algosyan, Dilge Eraslan, Sani Karamustafa

Google’s AMI program: Mike Tyka, Kenric McDowell, Andrea Held, Jac de Haan

Refik Anadol studio members and collaborators: Raman K. Mustafa, Toby Heinemann, Nick Boss, Kian Khiaban, Ho Man Leung, Sebastian Neitsch, David Gann, Kerim Karaoglu, Sebastian Huber

As time fleets past, humans are endlessly escaping from prison and simultaneously being discarnate. As a “discarnate man” we have left the self behind. According to Marshall McLuhan, a discarnate man is a human being who still processes his body in the physical world, but whose self or identity could be present in other phantom electronic place. We unconsciously discard the self in an invisible and unceasing phase of growing up.

We are destined to be born in a certain place with a certain skin color and to speak a certain language. Somehow we begin to abandon our own roots and turn to implant in other mainstream cultures. Childhood talk with one’s mother is similar to talking to oneself. The native language with a pure mind is nowadays no longer precious. Will you still please listen to me while I share a story of childhood in my own language?

L’Enfant invites the audience to step into a concealed world constructed by artists. The performance involves techniques using a drone with a camera to detect and capture the scene and the audience reaction. The recorded image will be projected on the screen in an interactive approach through programming design.

Credits

Project mentor: Mikael Fock
Directors (digital artists): I-Chun Chen, He-Lin Luo
Sound designer: Jin-Yao Lin
Producer: Ruei Yen

Technical director: Chia-Sheng Chu
Stage Manager: Hong-Ting Xie
Lighting designer: Shawn Lee
Sound engineer: TP Chen

Advised by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of China
Presented by Quanta Art Foundation, QA Ring and Ars Electronica
Associated with Liang Gallery

Sponsored by Quanta Computer

Ben-Ary had a biopsy taken from his arm; then he cultivated his skin cells and, using iPS technology, he transformed the skin cells into stem cells, which were then differentiated into neural networks grown over a multi-electrode-array (MEA) dish to become “Guy’s external brain.” The MEA dishes consist of a grid of 8 x 8 electrodes. These can record the electric signals the neurons produce and send stimulations back to the neurons—a read-and-write interface to the “brain”. Human musicians are invited to play with cellF. The human-made music is fed to the neurons as stimulation, and the neurons respond by controlling the synthesizers. Together they perform live, reflexive and improvised sound pieces that are not entirely human. The sound is spatialized into sixteen speakers. The spatialized reflects the pockets of activity within the MEA dish. Walking around the space offers the sensation of walking through Guy’s external brain.

cellF was initiated and spearheaded by the artist Guy Ben-Ary. It is also the result of a collaborative work involving Ben-Ary as well as the designer and new media artist Nathan Thompson, electrical engineer and synthesizer builder Dr. Andrew Fitch, musician Dr. Darren Moore, neuroscientist Dr. Stuart Hodgetts, stem-cell scientist Dr. Michael Edel and neuro-engineer Dr. Douglas Bakkum. Each contributor played an important role in shaping the final outcome.

Credits

The project is supported by the Australia Council for the Arts and the Department of Culture and the Arts WA.

The project is hosted by SymbioticA @ the University of Western Australia.

Ad Infinitum parasitically attaches itself to curious visitors when they reach inside to grab the handle of a crank mechanism. The parasite lowers a set of cuffs that hold the visitor’s arm in place and simultaneously attaches a pair of electrodes to the visitor’s wrist muscles. It then proceeds by stimulating the visitor’s muscles with small electrical impulses. When the muscles involuntarily contract, they automatically move the handle, which generates kinetic energy on the crank mechanism. The parasite leeches on that energy and keeps on electrically persuading the visitor to move their muscles. The only way a visitor can be freed is by enticing another visitor to sit on the opposite chair and take their place.

This experimental setup reminds us that, on the brink of artificially thinking machines, we are no longer just “users”; the shock we feel in our muscles triggers an involuntary gesture that acknowledges our intricate relationship to the uncanny technological realm around us.

Credits

http://www.a-parasite.org

Acknowledgments: Astrid Thomschke

Supported by Hasso Plattner Institute & VIDA16 Incentive Award

NoodleFeet is the functioning robotic manifestation of an illustrated character built from light metal, 3D-printed parts and found objects. Noodle has been developed with mechanical and electronic systems which allow him to exhibit behaviors when stimulated by objects in his environment. His purpose is to exist freely in the world while reacting to situational encounters using self-defining methods of personal expression. Where most technology has a practical or utilitarian application meant to enhance our lives, Noodle is a unique entity who functions without regard to a human’s perception of his purpose or usefulness. The artist’s goal is for this to provoke consideration about the motivation behind humanity’s current innovations. She hopes that those who interact with Noodle will witness a meaningful sense of self from him that will encourage reflection with regard to the value of their own relationship to the technology common in everyday life.

Credits

This project is presented in the framework of the European Digital Art and Science Network and co-funded by the Creative Europe program of the European Union.

Dragan Ilić (RS/AU/US)

A3 K3 is a unique interactive experience. Artworks are created by machine technology and audience participation. Dragan Ilić uses an elaborate brain-computer interface (BCI) system where he controls a hi-tech robot with his brain via state-of-the-art technology.

Members of the audience are invited to try out the BCI technology. The artist and the audience draw and paint on a vertical and a horizontal canvas with the assistance of the robot. The robotic arm is fitted with DI drawing devices that clamp, hold and manipulate various artistic media. They can then create attractive, large-format artworks. Ilić thus provides a context in which people will be able to enhance and augment their abilities in making art. Thanks to the support of g.tec, Dragan Ilić will undertake further research with AI systems/human interaction in the process of making art.

Credits

This program is supported by g.tec and GV Art London.

Our interactive installation responds to a commonly cited social fear–robots taking over work from humans. The World Economic Forum predicts that robots will take five million jobs over the next five years. However, we believe in a more optimistic future, where robots do not replace humanity, but instead enhance and complement it. Ordinarily, robots like Mimus are completely segregated from humans as they do highly repetitive tasks on a production line. With Mimus, we illustrate how wrapping clever software around industry-standard hardware can completely reconfigure our relationship to these complex, and often dangerous, machines. Rather than viewing robots as human adversaries, we show a future where autonomous machines like Mimus might be companions that peacefully co-exist with us on this planet.

Industrial robots are the foundation of our robotic infrastructure, and have remained relatively unchanged over the past 50 years. With Mimus, we highlight an untapped potential for this old industrial technology to work with people, not against them. Our software illustrates how small, strategic changes to an automation system can take a one-ton beast-of-a-machine from spot welding car chassis in a factory, to curiously following a child around a museum like an excited puppy. We hope to show that despite our collective anxieties about robotics, there is potential for empathy and companionship between humans and machines.

Credits

Madeline Gannon is the founder and principal researcher of ATONATON

Development Team: Madeline Gannon, Julian Sandoval, Kevyn McPhail, Ben Snell

Supported by: Autodesk, ABB Robotics, and The Studio for Creative lnquiry

About the artist

Madeline Gannon (US) is a multidisciplinary designer working at the intersection of art and technology. She leads ATONATON, a research studio inventing better ways to communicate with machines. In her research, Gannon designs and implements cutting-edge tools that explore the future of digital making. Her work blends disciplinary knowledge from design, robotics, and human-computer interaction to innovate at the edges of digital creativity. Gannon is currently completing a PhD in Computational Design at Carnegie Mellon University, where she is developing techniques for digitally designing and fabricating wearables on and around the body.

Lesen Sie mehr auf: starts-prize.aec.at.

This project is presented in the framework of the STARTS Prize 2017. STARTS Prize received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 732019.