Ars Electronica

Today I stumbled upon an Ars Electronica exhibition happening in Berlin, and I couldn't believe my luck!

“What Machines Dream Of” is a collection of art-machines that have little in common with their industrial and commercial counterparts. Here, there’s no trace of rationality, perfection or efficiency-optimizing logic. This show presents machines and robotic apparatuses that don’t produce a single thing besides the stories they have to tell us. And even if no machine in the world will ever come close to equaling what nature is capable of creating, every single one of them is nevertheless impressive testimony to humankind’s striving to discover, to comprehend and to master the world around us.

Humankind has been building machines for millennia. But aside from the fact that deploying them makes some truly difficult tasks a lot easier or makes it possible to complete them in a fraction of the time, machines have always exerted a fascination all their own upon us, a fascination that raises interesting questions about the timeless motivations behind our strivings to create new automatons, robots and androids. Is it the urge not only to comprehend nature and its processes but also to recreate them? Or perhaps even our audacious pretensions to be capable of improving on the world as it is? Do we construct artificial devices in response to the boundaries we feel have been imposed upon us—to shift them outward or, if we can, abolish them altogether? Or is it simply our boundless curiosity that demands to be satisfied?"

I've always been interested in interaction design. It was extremely inspiring to finally see an Ars Electronica exhibit with my own eyes. Below are a few videos. Apart from these, there were many other interesting projects.

There was one where you type into a typewriter, and instead of paper, it had a screen, and the letters were not being printed, but being projected onto the screen. There were other flying creatures on the screen which would come and grab the letters that were being typed. You could interact with these letters exactly like on a real typewriter by moving the screen up and down, and by placing the letters. Sounds a little vague as I explain it but as they said "there’s no trace of rationality, perfection or efficiency-optimizing logic" in these machines!

An interactive dress

The enchanting dance

A self playing piano