"Meart - The Semi-Living Artist" @ ArtBots - "The robot talent show", Eyebeam Gallery, NYC
The Portrait Series
In this phase we continued our collaboration with Dr. Steve Pottters lab. Doug Bakkum joined the team (PhD student in Potters lab) and help us to futher develop the project. MEART was "drawing" portraits in ArtBots, similar to Biofeel. Yet we added a few features and enhanced the control paradigm and control algorithms.
A very important addition to the piece was "an eye". We mounted a camera above the drawing arm to monitor or "gaze" at the progression of the drawing and send some of this information back to the neurons as stimulations (see below). MEART was still a a geographically detached artist. Yet in this case the brain and the body worked at the same time zone, a fact that made the "Neural nurturer's" life easier (in biofeel the brain and the body worked in different timezones, most of the time in different days...).
So... its "brain" (dissociated rat neurons grown in culture) was growing in Steve Potters lab in Atlanta, USA and its body was installed inthe Eyebeam Gallery (NYC). The brain and body interacted through the internet (TCP/IP) in real time.
These neurons were cultured over 64 electrodes fitted on a glass substrate (MEA). These electrodes picked up 60 channels of activity from the neurons. The data received from the neural activity was processed both in Atlanta & NYC to control the robotic (drawing) arm in real time.
A dynamic feedback loop
The feedback loop was closed by stimulating the neurons (again, 60 electrodes, 60 different areas in the culture) when various events in the gallery space occured. In Artbots we had MEART "draw portraits". But as was mentioned before we took it a few steps further in comparison to the stimulation paradigm that we used in Biofeel.
A web cam (the eye of MEART) captured portraits of viewers within the gallery space. These images were then converted into a stimulation map and were used to stimulate the neurons (this was the beginning of the drawing process). A multi channel electrophysiological recording from a neuronal culture (“MEARTS brain”) was performed in Potter's lab. The resulting data sets were processed in two locations – Atlanta & the eyebeam gallery. The processed outcome was used to control and move the drawing arm. The progress of the drawing was monitored and compared with the original portrait. The difference between the original portrait and the progressing drawing was then sent back to the lab as another stimulation map to complete the feedback loop and this whole process continued until a threshold of marks on paper was passed. This was the end of a drawing (Click here for “how it works” diagram)
In artbots MEART was drawing for 2 days. MEART drew 7 portraits. 3 of the curators of the show (Douglas Repetto, Jenny Lee & Philip Glatner), 3 of viewers and one of a dog.
Whilst the exhibition was on, Mr Daniel Greenfeld, curator of “ spaceworks gallery” at “The Tank” (a midtown contemporary art space)), expressed his interest in exhibiting six MEART drawings in the official opening of the spaceworks gallery (17 th of July) in an exhibition entitled “For and because”
We agreed to exhibit there, and on the 16 th of July installed the work. It was interesting as we felt like the facilitators of MEART. MEART produced the art, we were there to install. In the official publications MEART was officially noted as one of the exhibiting artists. The following text accompanied the exhibited drawings:
These portraits were drawn by MEART – “The semi living artist”. MEART is a geographically detached artist. Its "brain" of dissociated rat neurons were cultured at Georgia Institute of Technology and its robotic body and video sensors were installed at the Eyebeam Galley, NYC, during the Artbots exhibition.
The brain and body interacted through the internet in real time providing a closed loop communication (feedback) thus providing a forum to address various scientific, ethical and artistic questions.
MEART is a collaborative research into semi living artistic entities of SymbioticA Research Group in collaboration with the Potter Lab and was kindly supported by ArtsWA and the WA lotteries commission.
This installation is dedicated to the memories of Dish # 4080 & Dish # 4821 who sadly passed away shortly after completing these artworks. ( July 17, 2003 ) |
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