Robot Dogs Among 100 Artists To Be Unleashed On Melbourne For 2023 NGV Triennial
The National Gallery of Victoria is hosting an unusual group of artists - three Boston Dynamics robot dogs - who have been trained to paint their own portraits for four months at the gallery.
Silicon Valley tech billionaire and venture capitalist favorite artist Agnieszka Pilat, who has worked as an artist at SpaceX and Boston Dynamics, is known for incorporating technology and futurism in her work, most notably the Boston Dynamics 30K. In fact, he lives in New York with a man named Basia.
But for the first time, Pilates is teaching a self-lubricating robot to perform at this year's NGV Triennale, which opens in Melbourne in December. Three robots paint on wall-mounted acrylic clay canvases using oil sticks for four months. They are programmed to understand different commands from hand movement, how much pressure to apply to the canvas and to draw a point or line in sequence.
Pilates and Robot are among 100 artists and designers taking part in the triennial, including Yoko Ono, Tracey Emin and Paris fashion house Schiaparelli.
Pilate takes Bassia to the NGV with Bonnie and Archie. He considers Bassian his "mate" and says he misses her while filming in Melbourne.
"It's like a little kid. At some point, you have to let your kid ride the bus alone, he just feels that way," she said.
A classically trained photographer, he was first introduced to robots when he was commissioned by Boston Dynamics to photograph a model known as Pillar Spot.
"I think it's a new celebrity, a new ruling class." "Paintings reflect power in society. Andy Warhol painted famous people, old pictures reflect the nobility. Now the power goes to cars and it is our responsibility to engage them properly. We, their parents, to engage them and "we train them. Be forward. Be beautiful.
Pictures of robots are often childish, a deliberate programming choice, as Pilates puts it, "a child of human age who knows much but understands little."
Pilatus' shareholders include telecom billionaire Craig McCaw and former Waymo CEO John Krafcik. He was commissioned to do the artwork for the latest Matrix movie. Some critics dismiss his art as a stool for the technological elite. "The industrial world is not happy with the tech billionaires and I sing their songs," Pilates previously said.
Footage of the robotic dogs, primarily used in mining and construction, has often gone viral, with some describing their unusual movements and agility as "scary" and "dystopian". Robotic dogs have been used as patrols along the US-Mexico border and even at crime scenes. In the year In 2021, the New York Police Department brought back a Boston Dynamics robot to be deployed in the Bronx after widespread response.
But Pilate sees them as 'peaceful' and allies of mankind. "I'm a techno-optimist. I like to say that I'm doing for cars what Diego Rivera did for the working class. And when people meet Spot in person, they fall in love quickly. Because it's hard not to be afraid of them. They're so beautiful."
Ono is among 100 other artists and designers in the 2023 NGV Triennale, which will feature text-based masterpieces on the gallery's exterior. New acquisitions by British artist Emin, including a five-meter-high neon-lighting of his own handwriting; and Chiparelli's costume and artistic director Daniel Roseberry will present a selection from their latest collection.
American sculptor Sheila Hicks, 88, will present her 2022 work, Nowhere to Go, a 10-meter-tall colorful bubble sculpture. And 79-year-old Pitzanztjara artist Betty Muffler will present her masterpiece, Nnggakari Ngura (Healing the Earth), above, which shows an eagle's-eye view of the Earth.
British artist David Shrigley, known for his dark and humorous style, will install "Real Good," a seven-meter-tall thumb sculpture made for the Fourth Place in Trafalgar Square shortly after Britain's Brexit vote, outside his gallery. In it, Britain's Ryan Gander places animatronic mice on a gallery wall that deliver prophetic messages through the voice of his young daughter.
Ten weavers and their students from Mun-dira, eastern Arnhem Land, built a 100-meter-long woven fish fence in Maningrida over two years. Tokyo-based artist Azuma Makoto creates a room-sized installation of Australian flowers and plants frozen in single crystal acrylic blocks, while American artist Hugh Hayden shows a large installation depicting an apocalyptic schoolroom filled with branches and dodo skeletons.
Announcing the series on Wednesday, NGV director Tony Ellwood said the three-year run would be "an engaging and thought-provoking look at the world today", focusing on three main themes: magic, memory and matter.
"The last three years have seen major structural changes in the community... The NGV Triennial gives artists a platform to express their concerns, ideas and most importantly, their hopes," he said.
