Paradoxes

Emotional or curious bots display signals that we humans perceive and interpret as emotions or attempts to interact. Yet human emotions aren't always straightforwardly black or white, yes or no, left or right. Hence I’m interesting in creating a creature that stirs up an uncanny or paradoxical feeling.

For instance, satisfying and repelling, soothing and uncomfortable, affection and disgust, presence and absence at the same time.

Above are examples where the visual presentation of the works create interesting and unsettling dynamics that provide both sensory and intellectual stimulation (though they aren't necessarily bots or creatures). Like 'Can't Help Myself', viewers can sense the distress and anxiety by movement or interaction provided by the creature.

As I recently picked up crochet, one idea is to create a contrast between the organic, tactile materiality versus what’s usually perceived as mechanical and inanimate. This can also be done by incorporating some sort of interaction: drawing input from the viewers and returning unexpected results.

Or transformation of ordinary objects. Four years ago I came across an art work in which an artist made a large stack of books that appeared to be breathing. Though I could not trace photos of this work anymore, I found a similar, equally interesting example by Nils Volker; the texture of plasticity gives rise to a sense of suffocation and restriction against the natural, unhindered rhythm of breathing or wind.

Another example that does not necessarily fit with the definition of a bot or creature, but I like how it transformed, transported, and translated real-time data into an installation, giving it constant movement and an illusory appearance of consciousness.