Where Art meets Engineering
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They behave like ants, walk like spiders, and see like bats.
But don't expect Ken Rinaldo's "Autotelematic Spider Bots" at your next picnic--they're all wires, microprocessors, and plastic.
Rinaldo, a professor in the Art and Technology program within Ohio State's Department of Art, created the bots as part of a recent exhibit in Sunderland, England's Museum & Winter Garden. His work was part of
the Lifelike AV Festival 06 which shows how technological creations can mimic living organisms. Rinaldo's robots were displayed next to the museum's collection of real spiders.
Fusing together elements of engineering, architecture, entymology, and more (often in collaboration with faculty at Ohio State), Rinaldo sought to create a quasi-ecosystem which senses, reacts, and "speaks" using an array of technological circuitry. Yet for all the sensors that control their movement--the bots employ a unique walking motion, which could have wide practical application--they also have an undeniable aesthetic grace. As Rinaldo says, "I am interested in the intertwined symbiosis of all living things at all levels and scales. What is happening in our technological world is a systemic approach which doesn’t take on ecology and communication.”
At Ohio State, Rinaldo teaches interactive robotic sculpture and video installation, 3D modeling and rapid prototyping and motion graphics for video and animation.
(notes from Ken Rinaldo: the work was built with the assistance of Matt Howard, collaborator and former student, and Ross Baldwin, current undergraduate student, and Kate Jones graduate of the Art & Techology program in the Department of Art.
They became possible with a generous commission from the AV Festival in Newcastle, England, curated by Honor Harger as well as plastics and rapid prototyping services donated by Laser Reproduction in Columbus. Other important contributors to this project were the College of Arts and Sciences, which granted an interdisciplinary research grant and the College of the Arts which augmented these funds to permit purchase of a new ZCorp rapid prototyping system. Additional help from Matt Bernhardt in The Knowlton School of Architecture was critical to the rapid evolution of this project and microprocessors and sensors from Parallax Inc., of Rocklin, California made for efficient construction and programming.
Related links:
College of the Arts
(text/video/images: University Marketing Communications & Ken Rinaldo)
Recent exhibitions featuring Ken Rinaldo's work:
WAZOWNIA GALLERY
Torun, Poland (2004)
UNIVERSITY ART MUSEUMS, UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND, VIRGINIA Richmond, VA (Oct.-Dec. 2004)
TURTLE BAY MUSEUM
Redding, CA (2004)
BIENNALE ELECTRONIC ARTS
Perth, Australia (2004)
ARS ELECTRONICA
Linz, Austria (2004)
IV INTERNATIONAL IMAGE FESTIVAL CALDAS UNIVERSITY
Manizales, Colombia (Nov. 2004)
