Sensitivity analysis: unexpected outcomes in art and engineering

ABSTRACT

Contemporary art and engineering research are both at their best when things don't turn out as planned. I'll present selected examples based on artworks developed with students and other collaborators involving robots and networks over the past 20 years. These projects set out to investigate intersections of technology and nature, such as the Telegarden, a robot installation that allowed online participants to remotely tend a living garden; Ballet Mori, a classical dance performed to sounds triggered by live seismic data; and Demonstrate, where an ultra high-resolution video camera raised eyebrows at the 40th anniversary of the Free Speech Movement. Every project led to unexpected twists and complications...I'll also argue that the languages of contemporary art and engineering research are complex, dynamic, and often frustratingly impenetrable to outsiders. In art, a blue disk can be a cliche, or, in the right place at the right time, profound. In engineering, analogous contexts determine the beauty of a coordinate frame or mathematical equation. In both spheres, aesthetic interpretation is based on knowledge of prior art and contemporary dialogues. Being so similar, it is not surprising that unexpected forces arise when these two spheres are brought together.

REFERENCES

• 1: Ken Goldberg , Hubert Dreyfus , Alvin Goldman , Oliver Grau , Marina Gržinić , Blake Hannaford , Michael Idinopulos , Martin Jay , Eduardo Kac , Machiko Kusahara, The robot in the garden: telerobotics and telepistemology in the age of the Internet, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2000

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  J. Computer Applications
  J.5 ARTS AND HUMANITIES
      Subjects: Fine arts

General Terms:
Algorithms, Design, Experimentation, Human Factors

Keywords:
art, engineering, network, privacy, robot, webcamera