Zwischenraume/In-Between Spaces
14 October 2010
Robococo: Petra Gemeinboeck, UNSW and Rob Saunders, FADP
Introduction: Andy Dong, FADP
About the talk
The installation Zwischenräume embeds a group of autonomous robots into the walls of a gallery. They punch holes through the walls to inspect what's outside, signal each other, and conspire. The work develops a political relationship between the stealthy invasion of digital surveillance and urban combat tactics in which soldiers break through private walls. The installation manifests this relationship in an autonomous sculptural process that marks and wounds our environment, leaving behind open scars. Yet the scenario also unfolds its own irony; compelled to survey all that's happening outside the robots continue to punch holes until they eventually un-wall the wall and thus unveil themselves. Combat tactics meets Gordon Matta-Clark. In this talk the speakers will present this latest work by robococo, explore the context for this research and their interdisciplinary practice.
About the speakers
robococo is the collaborative art practice of Petra Gemeinboeck and Rob Saunders that brings together their expertise in interactive installation and artificial intelligence. Their works engage participants in scenarios of encounter, in which they negotiate, conspire with or even solicit a machine-generated co-performer. Their pervasive, locative and robotic installations examine the boundary between the virtual and physical and how it is continuously perforated in our everyday lives. Both live and work in Sydney. Petra Gemeinboeck is Senior Lecturer in Interactive Media Arts at the College of Fine Arts, UNSW. Rob Saunders is Senior Lecturer in Design Computing at the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning, University of Sydney. Click here for more information.
Time: 6.30 to 8.00pm
Location: Lecture Theatre 1, Faculty of Architecture, Design & Planning, 148 City Rd
Cost: No charge, no bookings
Contact: Sue Lalor
Phone: 9114 0941