The Ars Electronica exhibition “Creative Robotics” 2018, featuring a prototype of the ITECH MSc Master Thesis “Cyber Physical Macro Material”, opened today in Linz, Austria and will run throughout the summer.

The key idea of Industry 4.0—networks interlinking all the infrastructure, machines and human beings involved in production processes—currently characterizes our conception of coexistence with robots. On one hand, it’s said that automation will facilitate fabrication processes and simplify our everyday life; on the other hand, rapid progress induces anxiety and insecurity at the thought of machines gaining the upper hand over the world we inhabit.

Beyond the realm of their industrial applications, however, members of a creative young generation of architects, artists and designers are now using machines to perform tasks that are radically different than the jobs they were designed to do—applications that highlight the possibilities of cooperation and alternative utilization. Can industrial robots be used to fabricate fascinating forms in the field of fashion design or to produce intricate objects out of clay? What does a bridge assembled out of robot-formed modules look like? Will our public spaces someday be teeming with intelligent robotic-architectural structures that automatically adapt to our needs?

The Creative Robotics exhibition demonstrates once again how industrial robots are being used outside of their intended areas of application in mass manufacturing, and have become a medium of artistic and creative expression and a catalyst for the implementation of innovative ideas and the manifestation of futuristic visions. Together with our prominent associates, we are exploring new ways to utilize industrial robot technology beyond the confines of big assembly lines.

Exhibition in cooperation with KUKA; Laboratory for Creative Robotics, Fashion and Technology program at Linz Art University; Institute of Robotics at JKU–University of Linz; Institute for Computational Design and Construction (ICD), University of Stuttgart; Centre for IT and Architecture (CITA) in Copenhagen; Co-de-iT in Turin; Nico Rayf @ Tree of Motion in cooperation with the Applied Robotics Lab and Wood Technology at the University of Applied Arts Vienna.

More information on the exhibition can be found here.
More information on the ITECH MSc Master Thesis can be found here.