Learn more about Michel Bret and the work that he developed with Couchot Edmond, La Plume e le Pissenlit.
Robotarium SP
by Leonel Moura (Portugal, 2010)
Installed in the Jardim Central de Alverca, in Vila Franca de Xira, Portugal, the Robotarium is the world’s first zoo for robots. Based on the Portuguese creatures, but with distinct morphology and behavior, five small robots were constructed exclusively for the Emoção Art.ficial 5.0 – Autonomia Cibernética.
Artist Leonel Moura works in the field of artificial intelligence and robotics. He created the Robotarium in 2007, and in that same year opened the gallery LEONEL MOURA ARTe, in Lisbon, centered exclusively on exhibitions of works made by robots. See also RAC3 – Robotic Action Painter, an artist robot, by Moura.
Evolved Virtual Creatures
by Karl Sims (United States, 1994)
This video is the result of a research that simulated Darwinian evolution by way of hundreds of virtual creatures – which “live” within a CM-5, a supercomputer elaborated in the 1990s by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In the process of the experiment, each of these creatures really evolved, learning to execute determined tasks – such as swimming in a simulated aquatic environment.
Artist, scientist and entrepreneur Karl Sims is the founder of Genarts, a North American company that creates special-effects software for the filmmaking industry. He studied computer graphics at MIT and graduated, from the same institute, in life sciences.
Tumbling Dream Chambers
by Boredomresearch (England, 2007)
An artwork involving artificial life composed of the two previous works Biomes and Randomseeds. It is formed by five displays resembling Petri dishes – glass recipients used in scientific experiments and for the culture of bacteria in laboratories – which are “inoculated” with two “seeds.” In the virtual biomes, artificial microorganisms are born, evolve and die.
See also Eden, by Jon McCormack, an ecosystem of artificial life.
Boredomresearch is an English artist collective formed by Paul Smith and Vicky Isley, researchers in the field of animation and computer art at Bournemouth University, England.
Bacterias Argentinas
by Santiago Ortiz (Colombia, 2004)
A work of web art in which a dynamic model of autonomous agents – in the form of words in a grammatical network – eat each other. In this process, the “bacteria” exchange genetic information and give rise to the emergence of uncommon narratives.
Learn more about autonomy, a central concept to some breeders of the art technology.
Santiago Ortiz is an artist, mathematician and researcher in the areas of art, science, and fields of representation. He works with techniques of communication, creation and expression that combine narrative and literature as well as digital and architectural spaces.
Performative Ecologies
by Ruairi Glynn (England, 2007)
A community of four robots is oriented by means of facial-pattern-recognition software. This artwork examines the interactive (and not only responsive) potential of robotic elements for engaging in forms of performative and nonverbal communication with the public.
Learn more about cybernetics, and understand basic concepts of artificial intelligence.
Ruairi Glynn began his career in art as a sculptor. He studied interactive design at the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, in London, and at the Institute of Digital Art and Technology, in Plymouth. He is a member of the group Interactive Architecture, of the Bartlett School of Architecture, in London. He studied under English cyberneticist Ranulph Glanville.
Eden
by Jon McCormack (2000)
An evolutionary installation of artificial life, which forms an ecosystem. The agents are cellular automata which interact with each other and with the environment.
Learn more about autonomy and interactivity, two central concepts to the creators of art technology.
Jon McCormack
An Australian artist. He is a senior professor of Computer Science and co-director of the Centre for Electronic Media Art of the University of Monash in Melbourne.
Verbarium
by Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau (Belgium - France, 1999)
An online interactive editor on which the users fill in a form with messages that in their turn transform into the genetic code of a collective and complex three-dimensional image. This “creature” enters a kind of a virtual herbarium, made up of other filled forms, based on verbs from various messages. Hence the name Verbarium.
Learn more about interactivity, a central concept to some breeders of the art technology.
Christa Sommerer, biologist born in Belgium, is a researcher at the Telecommunications Advanced Research Laboratory in Kyoto, Japan. Married to French artist Laurent Mignonneau, partner in her works, she uses principles of genetic engineering to produce beings that do not exist in nature. She is a teacher associated to Advanced Institute of Arts and Mediatic Sciences, Iamas, in Gifu, Japan.
Autonomy – Artworks
Also meet Eden, a Jon McCormack’s work: an ecosystem of artificial life.