AV festival - LifeLike?
Over the weekend I visited Newcastle to check out the AV LifeLike festival - where "the world's leading electronic artists hold a mirror up to the modern world".Luckily I was there to visit some friends in Newcastle...
We - three adults and toddler, drove to Sunderland to see Ken Rinaldo's Spiderbots.
Joe (ex Sussex COGS) and myself having a technical curiosity and some experience of interactive installations, public art and robotics.
12 robots in a pen, only three feebly working.
Not so impressive, the child was bored, the mother annoyed and we were amazed.
We spoke to the poor assistant who was answering irrate visitors, yes the batteries only last an hour and we only have 1 charger and the charging station does not work.
Its a pity for the robots were very interestingly constructed - if only they were actually working! One did walk a bit while we were there.
Lessons to be learnt here, especially showing work in a public arena - systems have to be robust, and things must work.
The woman who ran the cafe had some very strong opinions about the show - she was very underimpressed, especially as there had been a lot of money spent on the hype with PR events, wine etc.
Finally the AV guide, a disaster of mis-information! It was set out on a daily basis, all well and good, but if you wanted to find out where something was or what it was about, see another date, so you do, then back to find out where it was, no opening times, so you go through it again.
So that was Saturday, and on Sunday, lots to see said the guide. Where they were, what were they about, found that - opening times?
At the back of the guide all the venues were listed as being closed on a Sunday....
posted by rb at 3:05 PM
1 Comments:
The comments I made were written from a point of view of frustration! We saw the show at the end of the festival and had travelled some distance especially to see this work, with great anticipation too (enjoying previous work such as autopoesis). When we arrived, only 1 charger was working, and only three robots were active, the others were "dead".
The robots are beautiful, but with only three out of ten working (ie powered) the impact of the piece is completely lost. The opening is a special time when everything has to work, but robust day-to-day running is an essential requirement for any technology based art. I understand the problems, I appreciate the work that went into the robots, and we all wishfully wanted them to be working (active) - but they were not and that was our frustrating experience - knowing that they could have been.
I understand power is a challenge for free moving robots - solar panels, floor grids, feeding stations may solve these problems, but until then, 10 robots that each run for an hour need 20 batteries and 10 less-than-an-hour chargers plus a very active robot charger person!
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