Anna Dumitriu and Alex May are pioneers in creating robotic artworks that performatively explore our relationships to new technologies, from HARR1, our constantly moving humanoid robot which exhibits body language and boredom, to Antisocial Swarm Robots which make explicit the human need to project life-like behaviour on robots and explore our audience’s inability to deconstruct even the simplest algorithms.

They now propose to significantly develop their explorations of robotic movement through collaboration with the Human Robot Co-Mobility project creating an in depth investigation of future co-existence with intelligent embodied robots, based on a deep investigation of human and robot interaction and movement, focussing on proximity, touch, body language and interactivity.

They aim to create a new human - robot performance experience and installation where public audiences and researchers can reflect on the current research and speculative or playful future scenarios grounded in the latest research.

Their robots will be programmed in Alex May’s open source Fugio visual programming system and innovations will be shared with researchers. Working with Lucas Evers at Waag Society as producer they will ensure the widest dissemination of the final artwork through exhibitions, workshops, talks and the sharing of our processes and methodologies. 

Together, artists Anna Dumitriu and Alex May and the Human Robot Co-Mobility project at Schindler developed an exploration of robotic movement to investigate what our future co-existence with intelligent embodied robots might be, based on a deep investigation of human and robot interaction and movement, focusing on proximity, touch, body language and interactivity with socially-aware robots.

The co-creation team explored how humans and robots will co-exist in the future. Schindler are incorporating blue-sky thinking in their work; the robot acts as a facilitator to trigger discussions on diversity (including gender), and what it does mean to share one’s space with a humanoid robot. For the artists, working with such high-level facilities and mentoring allowed them to explore their practice further. The residency got good internal corporate exposure and potentially triggered an inspirational impact on Schindler’s corporate culture in terms of human/robot social interaction and ethics, and how the impact of robots in our industry should be discussed. Schindler and the artists are discussing the possibility to extend their collaboration.

Interview with Anna Dumitriu and Alex May at CENTQUATRE-Paris, during the STARTS Residencies Days 2020

Read the final report