Category Archives: Events
Workshop Poznan – International Days at Collegium Da Vinci
Some memories of our two workshops on 28th and 29th of October for Polish students at Collegium Da Vinci . Among other workshops during their International Days, students could learn programming of generative geometries that shift their shapes with the input of sound with Katrin or build their own parabolic directional speaker robot with Adam. We hope everybody learned something new!
ORF musikprotokoll – Psychophysics Machines
We enjoyed to be part of ORF’s musikprotokoll 2019!
Our psychophysics machines and reactive field line visuals were in the center of our Robotic performance at esc medien kunst labor on Friday 4th October 2019. The next day we gave a robotic workshop and an insight into the different psycho-physics effects that are the foundation of this piece.
ORF’s radio program will feature the concert soon. We are curious how the surround microphones of ORF’s recording team captured the directional sound sculpture we created! We will keep you updated!
Credit:
ORF Musikprotokoll; FR, 04.10.2019; © NICOLAS GALANI



















Curious Tautophone, Empathy Swarm und Dr. Doppler’s Machine at esc medien kunst labor Graz
It is fantastic to have a solo exhibition at esc medien kunst labor where Curious Tautophone, Empathy Swarm and Dr. Doppler as well as Multiplexing Tautophone and Swarm Drawings are all exhibited together.
Creating a dialog with the visitors about the use of technology today, from the use of emotion recognition to influence the mood of our Empathy Swarm to the poetic reflection of creating moments that can only be experienced in the here and now as an antithesis to omnipresent media consumption.
Thanks to Reni Hofmüller and the great team of esc who foster this communication and dialog!
We are also happy to be part of Steirischer Herbst 2019 with this exhibition and ORF’s Long Night of The Museums / Lange Nacht der Museen!
Exhibition dates:
21 September 2019 – 15 November 2019
Opening times:
Tuesday – Friday 2 PM – 7 PM
or after arangement
Credit:
EMPATHY SWARM, CURIOUS TAUTOPHONE AND DR. DOPPLERS MACHINE
esc medien kunst labor 2019
Foto: Martin Gross










50 robots at QUT till 27th of October
After a fantastic opening with a great speech by Courtney Peterson and a huge success with more than 2000 visitors on the first weekend with ROBOTRONICA, the robots are now swarming at QUT Art Museum till the 27th of October.
Thanks to the QUT team for a smooth setup and the great didactic space!
Closed Mondays
Tuesday – Friday 10AM – 5PM
Saturday Sunday 12PM – 4PM
—
Installation view of Empathy swarm at QUT Art Museum, Brisbane
Photos by Carl Warner
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.
Robotics and technology festival with Empathy Swarm
Shortly after the opening of Empathy Swarm we and our robots are part of ROBOTRONICA !
Showcasing some of the world’s latest advancements in robotics and technology, Robotronica is a celebration of innovation and an opportunity to glimpse the possibilities of the future.
Join us on Sunday 18 August for an artist talk and showcase of the swarm!
Empathy Swarm Premiere in Australia at QUT Art Museum
Empathy Swarm comes to Australia! Our robots are looking forward to be in Brisbane at QUT Art Museum from , 17 August – 27 October 2019 and to meet people from another continent.
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.
Curious Tautophone still to be seen at Latrobe Regional Gallery till 30th of June
Curious Tautophone on Australia tour – this time in Victoria at Latrobe Regional Gallery: 6 April – 30 June 2019










Empathy Swarm exploring the Human Aspect at Grotowski Institute, WRO Biennale 2019
Thanks WRO for the fantastic opening week of the HUMAN ASPECT, Media Art Biennale WRO 2019 .
In the format of a performative installation visitors could spend intimate moments with the swarm.
Through the setting in a completely dark space humans got soaked into the swirling light pool of robotic creatures. Taking off their shoes and being very careful visitors made first contact with this new species, that shares motion and behaviors, positions in space and a changing need for closeness and distance as a mutual language. Sometimes scared to be run over by a storm of giant humans, sometimes angry about this lack of space, but most often friendly, playful and totally curious about the humans.
Interacting, meditating, playing rough and dancing smoothly – we received a lot of great feedback about the man-machine bonding time of the people of Wroclaw and our Empathy Swarm. We got especially touched by a young boy who came repeatedly, feeling responsible for the robots and talking about nothing else to his mom until they came back.
It was great to explore and experiment at Grotowski Institute in the center of Wroclaw’s lovely old town! We enjoyed being part of the multitude of fantastic art, events and performances all over the city, meeting old and new friends and celebrating the 30th anniversary of WRO!
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.












Swarming for 42 hours at Meta Marathon!
Our Empathy Robots and us had a fantastic time at Meta Marathon 2019 – Robotics at NRW-Forum in Düsseldorf last weekend!
Visitors could get into the role of swarm robots to experience being part of an emergent system. In this playful workshop they could learn the rules and parameters that are the foundations of emotional swarm behavior. From this understanding they afterwards could generate and design their own behaviors for the robots in real-time with a custom-made ‘swarm behavior synthesizer’. Thinking about 7 different emotions – happy – sad – neutral – angry – surprised – afraid – disgusted – the behaviors they generated will become part of the data set for the robots emotional responses.
We had a lot of interest, great discussions and nice feedback with and from visitors while exhibiting the Swarm at the IMPAKT zone of the festival.
During all the 42-hours and during our presentation and talk on Sunday with Klaas Werner from medienwerk.nrw and So Kanno we represented the facet of non-humanoid robots of the festivals theme of non-stop living, working, coexisting and cooperating with robots and introduced the idea of movement as means of a mutual language of man and machine based on Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel’s 1944 Experimental Study of Apparent Behavior.
We want to thank medienwerk.nrw and Klaas Werner for inviting us to talk about the project, its backgrounds, the future of robotic empathy and the role that swarm intelligence plays.
Also thanks to IMPAKT who hosted Empathy Swarm in the IMPAKT Zone at the festival.
META Marathon 2019 – Presentation & Talk @ NRW-Forum Düsseldorf with medienwerk.nrw
Empathy Swarm meets Sophia and Pepper – almost. We are looking forward to discuss how our non-anthropomorphic robot swarm can produce a feeling of Empathy with some humanoid robots in the audience at the festival Meta Marathon 2019 – Robotics.
42 hours non-stop living and working with robots, coexisting and cooperating, celebrating and drinking, loving and laughing: The META Marathon 2019 from March 15-17, 2019 is dedicated to the topic of robotics and transforms the NRW-Forum into a real laboratory for a whole weekend.
Robot Swarm – Presentation & Talk
(with the Office medienwerk.nrw) / with:
Katrin Hochschuh, Adam Donovan, So Kanno.
Moderation: Klaas Werner
WRO 2019 – Media Art Biennale HUMAN ASPECT with Empathy Swarm
We are happy to be part of the Media Art Biennale WRO 2019 in Wroclaw and to celebrate their 30th anniversary together with them and Empathy Swarm!
From mid-May Empathy Swarm will be part of Poland’s largest show of international contemporary art and examine the HUMAN ASPECT from a post-technological perspective.
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.





















































DEX workshop in Bangkok – 9 fantastic days with students!
From learning the basics of programming Arduino and soldering distance sensors, servo motors and RGB-Leds to the micro-controller to developing a kinematic system that can react to the sensor input and is actuated by the motors. – It was a very busy week for the INDA design and architecture students – With a beautiful outcome and the good feeling that some more students are now enabled to become makers and not consumers of technology!
We are also proud that the results of the workshop were part of the Bangkok Design Week!
Thanks to the DEX team! Especially Hadin Charbel! We had a great time!












Impressions of Empathy Swarm at Machines are not alone, device_art, MSU Zagreb
Emotional swarm robots of Empathy Swarm interact with the guests of Zagreb’s Museum of Contemporary Art and proof that Machines are not alone.
The robots and us experienced exciting days: from the robot’s first contact to strangers at the opening on Tuesday to a vivid discussion on ‘Autonomous relations: actions, reactions & tangled sovereign systems’ with artists Luiz Zanotello and Ralf Becker on Thursday and our final goodbye to the robots on Friday, who will now stay till 3. February 2019 all by themselves. Crazy to see the little ones grow up and become independent 🙂
We also want to thank KONTEJNER again for their hospitality and precious help setting up! We always feel very welcome in Zagreb and like part of the big Kontejner famiiy! ♥
Empathy Swarm will be at Device Art – Machines are not alone from 18. December 2018 – 3. February 2019.
(pictures © Kontejner, Sanjin Kastelan, Dragan Matić / HANZA MEDIA, Hochschuh&Donovan)
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.
DEX workshop in Bangkok – we are coming!
We are looking forward to the first weeks of January and our 9-day DEX -Design EXperimentation – workshop with students from Chulalongkorn University. Under the title “Technology sublime – Preventative medicine for a dystopian future.” architectural students learn about the basics of sensors and electronics to create a kind of activated architecture or a little companion that reacts to environmental stimuli from light to CO2 levels, while thinking about the larger picture and a scenario of how sensed data and a creative mechanism can help the world.





device_art OPENING tomorrow 18. December 2018, 19:00
A little preview on our shiny swarm robots! And a warm invitation to tomorrows opening!
@ Museum of Contemporary Art, Avenija Dubrovnik 17, Zagreb – 19:00!







Empathy Swarm – setting up for Device Art – MACHINES ARE NOT ALONE – at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb
It is fantastic to be back in Zagreb! After our EMAP/EMARE residency with Kontejner this summer, we are now presenting Empathy Swarm at Device Art – Machines are not alone!
“Everywhere it is machines and machines are not alone.” (curator ZHANG Ga)
The major exhibition concept fits perfectly to a swarm of empathetic robots that are waiting to interact with the visitors swarming through the exhibition.
At the moment still busy setting up and fine tuning our work to the space of the museum, but looking forward to a fantastic opening @ Museum of Contemporary Art, Avenija Dubrovnik 17, Zagreb – 19:00!
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
The work is coproduced at Kontejner within the framework of EMAP / EMARE and co-funded by Creative Europe.






Warming up for Device Art with Psychophysics Machines in Split
As a warm-up for the Device Art festival of Kontejner in Zagreb, we took 3 of our psychophysics machines on a road trip to Split. The two Megatautophones joined Dr. Doppler and us for a nice performance at MKC Split – Multimedijalni kulturni centar . After the performance in a short talk, moderated by Klara Petrović from Kontejner, we introduced our Empahty Swarm and invited everybody to the opening at the Musuem of Contemporary Art – MSU Zagreb on 18th of December.
(pictures © MKC Split / Platforma 9,81)