soft-machines — Current — Chico MacMurtrie

About the exhibition

Evolutionary biology, meteorology, ecology, neuroscience, and robotics are just a few examples of the complex systems that artists engage within the exhibition Future Tense: Art, Complexity, and Uncertainty. Complex systems are dynamic, uncertain, and unpredictable. They are characterized by chaos, feedback loops, self-organization, and emergent behavior. Future Tense features both emerging and established contemporary artists who utilize the concepts of complex systems in traditional media and new technologies such as computer modeling, robotics, and data visualizations. This includes existing work by Ralf Baecker, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Julie Mehretu, Clare Rojas, and Theresa Schubert, as well as new works by Newton Harrison, Chico MacMurtrie, Lucy HG Solomon & Cesar Baio collective, Laura Splan, and Gail Wight, commissioned for this exhibition by the Beall Center's Black Box Projects artist residency program.

Dual Pneuma is made possible with support from the UC Irvine Beall Center for Art + Technology, Creative Capital, and Getty. The software development was supported by Bill Bowen and Michael T. Tolley, Ph.D., Associate Professor at UCSD's Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Bioinspired Robotics and Design Lab, along with his graduate students Shenglin Yan and Allyson Chen. Additional support was received from R. Luke Dubois, director of the Brooklyn Experimental Media Center at the N.Y.U. Tandon School of Engineering, and his graduate student Checo Cadena. MacMurtrie collaborated with Fabricio Cavero, a Ph.D. candidate at U.C.I., to sonify the terracotta sculptures and with Hugo de Souza Kolsky, an M.F.A. candidate at Cooper Union, on inflatables and clay.

Please join Chico MacMurtrie/Amorphic Robot Works on Saturday, July 27, for an in-progress viewing of new work and recent developments! Please RSVP to RoboticChurch[at]gmail.com

Discover MacMurtrie’s most recent project, Dual Pneuma, a soft-robotic performer evoking a humanoid body with four limbs that allow for a transition from quadrupedal to organic form and motion. Composed of inflatable, high-tensile fabric muscles, the artwork is capable of assuming a wide range of human, animal, and insect-like positions.

MacMurtrie is additionally developing a series of ceramic works cast directly from the soft-robotic figure. Compressed air will be channeled through the ceramic sculptures to produce whistling sounds, sonifying the artwork in reference to the water and wind-based huaco instruments of early Mesoamerican cultures.

MacMurtrie and his team will activate the inflatable Dual Pneuma prototype and various sonic elements of the Dual Pneuma terracotta sculpture at the Robotic Church studio. Get a sneak peek of his work in progress before it travels to the Beall Center for Art + Technology as part of Getty’s upcoming PST Art: Art & Science collide, opening August 24th in Irvine, California.

Dual Pneuma is made possible with support from the UC Irvine Beall Center for Art + Technology, Creative Capital, and Getty. The software development was supported by Bill Bowen and Michael T. Tolley, Ph.D., Associate Professor at UCSD’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Bioinspired Robotics and Design Lab, along with his graduate students Shenglin Yan and Allyson Chen. Additional support was received from R. Luke Dubois, director of the Brooklyn Experimental Media Center at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering, and his graduate student Checo Cadena. MacMurtrie collaborated with Fabricio Cavero, a Ph.D. candidate at UCI, to sonify the terracotta sculptures and with Hugo de Souza Kolsky, M.F.A. candidate at Cooper Union, on inflatables and clay.

Over the next year, the inflatable Dual Pneumas will evolve into a larger site-specific and immersive installation at the Robotic Church entitled Soft-Machines at the Robotic Church. Currently in development, this project will transform into a living installation of MacMurtrie’s soft-machines. These inflatable robots will move and emote together in an intricate choreography of sight and sound, immersing viewers in a speculative exploration of the fluid boundaries between animal and machine.

During this in-progress viewing, visitors will experience the activation of the first prototypes for this installation, emphasizing the possibilities they offer in terms of movement and positioning within the performance space.

The installation Soft-Machines at the Robotic Church is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

The event will conclude with the screening of MacMurtrie’s Border Crossers film from 8:30 - 9 P.M. Border Crossers is an ongoing performance series along the U.S. Mexico border involving several inflatable robotic “Border Crossers.” MacMurtrie’s eponymous film captures these robotic sculptures as central characters in a documentary plot that illuminates communities and landscapes often obscured by border politics. Vulnerable yet resilient, alone yet supported by the community, the Border Crossers encounter various people, machines, and plant and animal life as they rise and arch over the U.S.–Mexico border from both sides.

The Border Crossers film was produced in collaboration with Kerry Doyle, Director of the Rubin Center for the Arts, The University of Texas at El Paso. The film was made possible in part by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature through the Media Arts Assistance Fund, a regrant partnership of NYSCA and Wave Farm.

Dual Pneuma by Chico MacMurtrie. Photo: Hector Bracho.