A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S

AL IVEMACHINES

A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S

Eleni
Xynogala

2017
2018

CONTEXTUALREPORTMA
INTERACTIO N DESIGNCO MMUNICATION

L o n do n Co llege o f Co m muni cation
U n ivers i t y o f the Arts Lo ndon

CONTENTS
FIG URESINTROD U C T I ON
CON T EXTCASE S TUDI ES

CONC LU SI ON
B I B LIOG RA PH Y

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H omogen eit y in h u m a n - m a ch in e c o - c re at i o n
Assigning agency to a non-human actor
Embodiment and Materiality
Interaction and Unpredictability
Black F l ag sNyloïdMotive Colloquies
Omnia per Omnia

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FIGURES

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FIGURE 1

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FIGURE 2

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FIGURE 3
FIG URE 4
FIGURE 5
FIGURE 6
FIGURE 7
FIGURE 8
FIGURE 9

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A ntho ny Du n n e a n d Fion a R aby,
Te chn ol ogic a l Drea m s S eries, N o.1 , R o b o t s,
200 7
Universal Everything, Hype Cycle: Machine Learning,
2018
Superflux, Uninvited Guests, 2015
Masahiro Mori, Uncanny Valley, 1970
André and Michel Décosterd, πTon, 2018
William Forsythe, Black Flags, 2011
André and Michel Décosterd, Nyloid, 2013
Ruairi Glynn, Motive Colloquies, 2011
Sougwen Chung, Omnia per Omnia, 2018

INTRODUCTION“ Fi rs t , yo u bu i l d t h e
m a ch i n e, t h e n i t t e l l s
yo u wh at i t ’s fo r. ”
- C at h e ry n n e M . Va l e n t e

The purpose of this research is to explore the ways
in which we can avoid dualities of human and nonhuman entities and assign agency to the co-performers
through the lens of dance. Located in Donna Haraway’s
notion of cyborg, that will be described in the following
chapter, this project is opposed to dichotomies, such as
nature and culture, concrete and abstract, human andmachine. Experimenting with creative techniques, thisresearch questions what impact this context has in thecontemporary performance scene.
The title of this report represents the position that there isan inherent liveness in the machines. The design outcomeof this research is going to be a performance from humanand non-human entities. The performance is located in themethod of artistic practice, that has a long-term history. On
the other hand, the notion of the cyborg is a more recent
term, which is not related to the performative arts field.
This research investigates the possibility of collaborating
this method with this field and raise further questions
around these concepts. Can we collaborate with a robot
to dance and improvise? What is the robot’s role in theperformance? What is its aesthetic? Can we learn with andthrough them?

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My research is a speculative exploration of the futureof human-machine collaboration through the lens of
performance. I try to speculate about “how things could
be - to imagine possible futures” (Dunne and Raby,2013). In my concept, the boundaries between the man
and the machine are blurred. Many people support thatmachines and computational systems cannot be creative,
but I want to question and debate this norm, trying tofind the metaphorical and philosophical components
under the machines and its movements. Posing “what if”
questions, I am trying to discuss the future of dance andthe relationship that it could have with non-human forms.
Dunne and Raby (2007) have also developed TechnologicalDreams Series, No.1, Robots (Figure 1), based on the ideathat “robots are destined to play a significant part in ourdaily lives - as technological cohabitants”. In this research,
I am trying to open up space for discussion and speculate
about an equal relationship between a robot and aperformer.

Figure 1: Anthony Dunne and Fiona
Raby, Technological Dreams Series,
No.1, Robots, 2007

Dancing is an ancient way of expression. Nowadays
many people that are interested in dancing try to find
new ways to express themselves, but also to expand thefield through contemporary ways of digital art. Specifically,
Hype Cycle: Machine Learning (Figure 2) is a projectfrom Universal Everything (2018), which questions “whenmachines will achieve human agility”. There are plentyof projects, workshops and festivals that build graphics,
capturing dancers’ movements. So, going one step further,and including in dancing practice a non-human form,
would be an idea that would interest some people of the
field. It would also be interesting for people that are notenthusiastic for dance to see a new interpretation of it,
made of the human and machine improvisational cocreation.

Figure 2: Universal Everything, Hype
Cycle: Machine Learning, 2018

My personal interest in this project is multidimensional.
First of all, I am interested in performance as a way ofembodiment expression for my practice. Secondly, in termsof implementation, I find it very challenging as I want to
explore new techniques for kinetic art that include sensors
and sound. I aim to locate my work in a performative
practice that allows collaboration of people -performer andaudience- with a machine in an exhibition space. However,this research is also focusing on researchers, practitioners
and choreographers that are interested to include in theirwork aspects of choreography and dance into the newcomplex, embodied and physical forms. For instance,
Motion bank, Choreographic Coding Lab and Node Festival,
that deal with the subject of digital simulation of dancing,
could be interested in looking into robotics forms indancing performances.
This research is based on primary and secondary researchin the ideas of complex relations between hybrid entities,
embodied intelligence, materiality, agency and interactionof the participants. It starts from secondary research into
the literature so as to find interesting insight in concepts
and frameworks that I want to be based on, but also inother case studies that I want to analyse and criticize.
Then, I conduct primary research through experimentationand testing so as to support my analysis.

The research starts from the literature analysis with theframeworks of cyborg and naturecultures from Donna
Haraway, and it tries to synthesize new ideas andrelations for the human and machine co-creation. It
discusses ideas of multiagency from Actor-Network Theory
and the role of the posthuman that comes from Kathrine
Hayles and speculates for an automate agency for dancing
survival and development. Then, it refers to the concept ofthe materiality and the embodied forms of the medium.
Finally, it explores the forms of interaction that I would
like to experiment, through the theoretical framework ofanimistic design by Betti Marenko and Philip van Allen.
Except for the literature texts, the research is looking into
specific case studies that express human-machine cocreation or the potentialities of machine randomness.
Analysing and criticizing four other projects I want tofind the strengths and the weaknesses that I could use
in my own practice and that can create a tool for otherpractitioners. Black Flags by William Forsythe is a dancing
performance by industrial robots that debate the traditionalchoreographic thinking. André and Michel Décosterd’sNyloïd is a performative installation from a robot that ischaracterized from assigning unpredictability and machine
agency, creating a narrative of a living object. Motive
Colloquies, created by Ruairi Glynn and other practitioners,

8

investigates a speculation for hybrid environments
between living buildings and human beings. Last but notleast, Sougwen Chung creates the drawing performance
Omnia per Omnia, which explores the potentialities of cocreation between the human and the robots, sharing equalroles and multiagency.
In my practice, the methods that I will use in order todevelop these theoretical ideas into practice have been
analyzed by other designers and practitioners. In the book
Design research through practice, the construction takes
place with a prototype, a scenario, a mockup, a detailed
concept. “The interesting thing is to explore an issue,
to figure out how to turn it into a project, how to turnthe project into some design ideas, how to materialize
those design ideas as prototypes, and finally, how todisseminate them through exhibitions or publications”(Koskinen et al., 2012). Starting from experimentation indesign concepts, my work is going to be presented in an
exhibition place and will try to criticize, speculate anddebate the norms of human-machine co-creation and thepossibilities of multiagency, so as to make people thinkand discuss all these ideas. It is an important part of theeffectiveness of this research to evaluate how people willinteract with the final performance and what their feedback
and reactions are for the ‘alive’ machines.

9t h e re i s a n
i n h e re n t
l ive n e s s
in them a ch i n e s

A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S

CONTEXTHomoge n i t y i n h um an- m ach i ne co - creat i on
In 2018 the distinctions between the brain and the body,or the human and the machine have been questioned
and do not represent antagonistic concepts anymore. A
characteristic example of this norm is the Omnia per
Omnia by Sougwen Chung. In this hybrid performance,
we can clearly see that a human being collaborates withher robots in order to draw. There is no any competitionand duality, but only homogeneity in co-creation. This andother similar projects raise further questions, like how
we will interact with non-human forms and what newinterdependencies and relationships might exist.
This research is built on Donna Haraway’s frameworksof cyborg and naturecultures. Haraway discusses thereconfiguration of nature, to show the complexity of natureand culture, or body and mind, human and non-human. In
this research, we also deal with the complex relationshipbetween the human and the machine performer. Each ofthem is faced as a cyborg, “a cybernetic organism, a hybridof machine and organism, a creature of social reality
as well as a creature of fiction” (Haraway, 1991) (p. 149).
Escaping these universal categories and distinctions ofwoman and male, or body and mind, the cyborg creates
its own identity, allowing multiplicity and contradictions.
11

Having this in mind and looking in multiple agencies, I
want to design and develop my own work, not throughthis dualism of human and machine, but through the prismof the cyborg that I am, my machine is, and my audience
is asked to be. We are all cyborgs in today’s society, andwith all the advantages and disadvantages that this entails,
we should try for survival and development.
Kathrine Hayles (1999) also supports that “humans
displaced as the dominant form of life on the planet byintelligent machines” (p. 283) and there is need of dynamic
partnership between these human and non-humanactors. In her book How we became Posthuman, Hayles
is referring to many other writers about this posthumanidea. For example, Veronica Hollinger expresses the ideaof deconstructing the human-machine opposition andfocuses on the techniques that we could use in order toproduce a mutual evolution (Hayles, 1999) (p. 264). Ihab
Hassan predicts the arrival of the posthuman, and Hayles
claims that we have always been posthumans (Hayles,
1999) (p. 274-279). In the partnership concept that I am
trying to create, I want to give the people the opportunity
to think about our evolution and the posthumanphilosophy, and as a result to face the machine as anintimate component, a heterogeneous force and a friendly
self.
However, no matter how these people try to undercut
dichotomies, “technology cannot replace the personalbonds that tie humans to humans, humans to animals
and humans to their own ownsenses” (Hayles, 1999)(p. 278). Kevin Kelly (2014) - a technological determinist,
has a different view from Kathrine Hayles, as he seestechnology as a near-living system that determines what
it wants and drives social evolution. He argues that weshould align ourselves with technology’s needs in order toprepare for the future. The truth is that we cannot be sureif this technological change is an evolutionary advanceor a catastrophe. For example, Uninvited Guests (Figure3) that created by Superflux Lab (2015) and focuses on a
criticism related to domestic space, echoes that machines
have not a collaborative and equal role with the human, butseem like they have enough agency to interpret the humanneeds.

Figure 3: Superflux, Uninvited
Guests, 2015

t h e cy b o rg
c re at e s i t s
ow n i d e n t i t y ,a l l ow i n g
mu l t i p l i c i t yandc o n t ra d i c t i o n sAss ig n in g age n cy t o a no n- h um an acto r
The term “actor” is coming from the Actor-Network Theory(AT) and is related with three writers - Michel Callon,
Bruno Latour and John Law - reaviling the complexitiesof our sociotechnical world. “An ‘actor’ in AT is a semiotic
definition -an actant-, that is, something that acts or towhich activity is granted by others. It implies no special
motivation for human individual actors, nor of humans ingeneral. An actant can literally be anything provided it isgranted to be the source of an action” (Latour, 2017). This
framework considers both human and non-human entities
equally as actors with the same amount of agency withina network, overcoming with this way the duality between
them. However, there are different views in the way that weface the technical objects. Georges Simondon (1958) (p. 12)
supports that “On the one hand, it treats them as pure andsimple assemblies of material that are quite without true
meaning and that only provide utility. On the other hand, it
assumes that these objects are also robots and that theyharbour intentions hostile to man.”
In my practice, I am not looking at the robot as a tool
but as a creative entity. There are no distinctions anddominance, but collaboration and multiagency.

“Creative machines are capable to expand the script they
are given by their human creator and skilful in bidding forthe audience’s attention, ‘translating’ software scripts intoan ‘experienceable’ reality” (Gemeinboeck, Saunders, 2015).
The cyborg expresses its creativity through movements,changing forms and shapes. It chooses to be slow or quick,to synchronize with the music or not, to jump, to rotate,or to kick, to relax or to explode. It learns from its partner
and its partner learns from it. They work together orseparate, organizing from internal or external stimuli.
Hayles is building on Haraway’s theory and refers to theposthuman, an entity that may help humanity to survive
and be develop.ed. Additionally, Hayles supports that in
the posthuman period “distributed cognition replaces
autonomous will; embodiment replaces a body seen as asupport system for the mind; and a dynamic partnership
between humans and intelligent machines replaces theliberal subject’s manifest destiny to dominate and control
nature” (Hayles, 1999) (p. 288). Both Haraway’s and Hayles’
theories are based on the argument that we need to stop
thinking of distinctions and look at more interesting andcomplex relations between human and14

non-human. Cyborg impacts posthuman and vice versa.
As a result, the future of dancing performances changes
accepting other creatures and ourselves. We should leavebehind the ideas of master dominance and the dualities ofvirtual and material, and we should accept the human andmachine union, so as to survive and develop.
In her book How we became Posthuman Hayles supportsthat “in posthuman view, the conscious agency has neverbeen in control” (Hayles, 1999) (p. 288) and asks reallyinteresting questions that are important to take into
account. “What if humans were made to function as if they
were components of another entity? What if a computer
behaved like a person?” (Hayles, 1999) (p. 251). The topic ofagency is important in this context, as we don’t know at
the end who is going to be in control and if the individual
agency will be possible. But the main goal is to experimentand ask these questions, targeting in a mutual creationfrom the actors and shifting the emphasis from ownershipto more interesting relations and equality.

regarded as requiring intuitive knowledge and creativity”(Hayles, 2005) (p. 142). We have the notion that if a
machine acts cognitively sophisticated then it must be
better than us. It is in human nature to engage withmediation and to appeal by human-like robots becauseof the uncanny valley phenomenon that described by
Masahiro Mori in 1970. The graph (Figure 4) depicts thisrelation between the human likeness of an element andthe perceiver’s affinity for this entity. It is like children’s
confusion over the computer’s aliveness. They know thatthey are not real, but they have the tendency to attributethem personality, because of the cognitive abilities of thecomputers to process information.

In this context, we talk about a speculation of assigningagency to the machines, as an extreme hypothesis
in order to bring discussion. But the truth is that wecreate the machines and we make them move, imposing
intelligence, creativity and other human characteristics. “Itis not whether machines are intelligent […] but whether
computers can solve problems that have traditionally been
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Figure 4: Masahiro Mori, Uncanny
Valley, 1970

we c re at ethem a ch i n e s
andimposethem
age n cy

Emb o d ime n t a n d M ateri ali ty
Hayles (1999) claims that there is intelligence embodied
in cybernetic machines and this unfolds in different ways,
contrast to human awareness (p. 284). She also argues
that “embodiment cannot exist without the material
structure” (Hayles, 1999) (p. 199). In other words, we needembodied creatures that enact intelligence, because there
is superiority of the moving embodied robots, comparedwith the digital algorithms, which have no moving
capability and are not able to discover their environment.
(Hayles, 1999) (p. 199). Through this new ideology indancing, the embodied experience changes. New material
structures that have dancing qualities inspire the humandancers. Whoever participates constitutes an embodied
informational entity. When these entities cooperate, theycreate a system. For example, both the human performer
and the robot, create individual systems which observeand impact each other. These systems are also observed
from an external system, like the audience, that is called togive its input in this performative co-creation.
In terms of embodiment and intelligence, physical devices
can be constructed informationally open in order tochoose the way that they will react to their internal andexternal conditions (1993), analyzing Gordon Pask’s
17electrochemical devices and their epistemologicalimplications, question “Could one construct devices
that have the capacity to adaptively construct their own
perceptual categories and their own means of influencing
the world?” (p. 2). This old experiment hides a lot ofinteresting aspects that we try to explore in this research,
like the importance of the physicality of the medium,instead of a digital algorithm in a screen.
Betti Marenko and Philip van Allen try to experimentwith similar topic through animistic design. The animistic
design is a research through making approach, that basedon the uncertain and unpredictable tries to reimagine theinteraction between the human and the non-human. “Thenotion of animism we propose draws on ideas of effect,agency (both human and non-human) and the material
relationality of interactive ecosystems, thus moving
away from the anthropomorphism.” Following their one
examples, we can allow the interaction to develop with acreative and unlimited process. The creative practice uses
prototypes - design experiments, so as to communicate
with complexity in an embodied manner, to raisequestions and generate discussion between designers foralternative futures.

t h e re i s
s u p e ri o ri t yof them ov i n gembodiedro b o t sI nte rac t io n a n d U n p red i ctab i li t y
So, “first comes the embodies materiality and then theconcepts evolve through interaction with the environment”(Hayles, 1999) (p. 263), or other actants. Hayles also
refers to the concept of randomness, which plays animportant role in the evolution of complex systems andshe questions for the kinds of the environments thatare going to be created because of them (p. 286-287).
Randomness is really important in the context of dancing
and improvisation. This is one of the factors that create
an interesting performance which is going to differ from
one time to another, depended on the random choices andmoods of the dancer and the robot.
I recently spoke with André Décosterd, one of the twocreators of the πTon (Figure 5) and he explained to me thatthe five segments of the long rubber tube are triggered tomove by the motors’ movement that follows the twistingof the material. The choice of the motor to move combinedwith the random place and angle of the whole structure
the specific time can create this unpredictable movement. In
this way, they had an incident once, that the motor nevertriggered any movement and the πTon stayed stable, during
the whole performance, like it was in bad mood, as André
said (Décosterd, 2018).
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The creature is surrounded by a group of human beings
equipped with vocal prostheses. In this way, André andMichel Décosterd using their artistic practice, prove thetheories of Hayles (1999), for “complex interactions within
an environment that includes human and non-humanactoras” (p. 288).
In the context of dancing performance, the robot,
choosing its movements with a combination of inputs
and randomness, can give inspiration to the humandancer, because of the combination of rhythm, postureand movement quality, that probably the human partner
never imagined before. And on the other hand, this coperformance opens the possibility that the movements
can be taken out of the human body and placed intoa machine. It is a surprising discovery to take human’s
dancing qualities out of the body and put them into amachine, where they can manipulate in a way that thehuman had never danced before.
In the animism framework, the same norms takeplace, trying to reimagine interaction with objects andreformulating agential issues. “Animistic design focuses on
experimenting with designed ecologies where the actors

engaged (objects, prototypes, humans, data and things)
affect each other in ways that allow not only uncertainty
and unpredictability to emerge but to capitalize onthem as a resource to trigger creativity.” In this way, themore agency we allow the robots to manifest, the more
uncertainty and unpredictable they will show to be.

This idea of disturbing interaction and add unpredictability
is really interesting for the design output of my practice.
But as we said also before, the machines have not reallythe agency, because we construct and operate them. So,
they are not really unpredictable as if we watch themcarefully, then we can predict their complex movements.

Figure 5: André and Michel
Décosterd, πTon, 2018

u n p re d i c t abl em a ch i n e sor
c o m p l ex
i n t e ra c t i o n s ?

A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E S
A L I V E M AC H I N E SCASE STUDIESB l ack Fl ags
William Forsythe has been researching and working on
interactive sculptures that he called Choreographs Objects.
He is questioning “Is it possible for choreography togenerate autonomous expressions of its principles, achoreographic object, without the body?”, but also “Whatelse, besides the body, could physical thinking look like?”(Forsythe, 2011). He supports that a choreographic object
is not acting in place of the body, but instead as analternative entity that suggests new potential kinetics andmotions. He is trying to offer insight into choreographic
ideas that would defend from the countless manifestationsof the choreographic thinking. In this way, his work
applies to the theoretical context of Kathrine Hayle about
the superiority of the embodied materiality, but also
the choices of Betti Marenko for non-anthropomorphic
machines that have an inherent liveness.
One of his Choreographic Objects is the Black Flags(Figure 6), a duet for two industrial robots that wave
enormous black flags. The waving flags are programmed
to move with gestural movements that control them andmake their motion seems like unpredictable. These nonanthropomorphic machines seem like they have life andmove like dancing.
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The noise of the industrial robots and their ability tocreate these continuous movements create a spectacularperformance for the audience, that feel like gazing a living
object. I am really interested in this practice of using theindustrial robots in this way and even further in the robot’s
context, instead of the exhibition place. Also, the choiceof the fabric as a material is really smart for this concept,
as it is a material that can be easily manipulated from theindustrial robots and can create the qualities that remind
us dancing.

Figure 6: William Forsythe, Black
Flags, 2011

Ny l o ïdNyloïd (Figure 7) is the result of a continues research onmechanical devices which have the ability to move in an
organic, unpredictable and harmonious way. These artists’main argument, that comes through experimentation, isthat the complexity of an organic mechanical movement
comes from the addition of many different constraints,
like compression or twisting, but also from strengths
that act at the same time in various directions. Theirapproach consists of a synthesis of many parts, suchas the materials and their mechanics, the structures
and their kinetic energies, the movement and musicalsynchronization, but also the musical composition. Theirwork is an “impressive sound sculpture, a tripod consistingof three nylon limbs of six meters in length animatedby a sophisticated mechanical and sound device”. Thisinstallation draws its dramatic power from the reactivityof its plastic and sound material, expressing a threatening
narrative. Similar to a living object, it’s tension, effort andsuffering, which result from its contortions and its vocal
manifestation, can be sensed.
This project represents a lot of the terms that we discussed
above, for the imposing of unpredictability and agency inthe machines.
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Under the label Cod.Act, the two artists André and Michel
Décosterd are always interested in exploring the senseof object agency. Nyloïd is a chaotic element that is notchoreographed, but it moves with perfectly random kinetics.
It hides a narrative that it is interesting and makes you
think that it is alive. I want also to use in my work thisinsight in structures, energies, dynamics and materials,
that create these complex kinetics that looks random andimprovised.

Figure 7: André and Michel
Décosterd, Nyloïd, 2013

Mo t ive C o l l o qui e s
Motive Colloquies (Figure 8) is a performative andinteractive installation that developed by interaction
designers, architects and performance artists. The project’s
research area focuses on the fact that as computation
dominate our built environment, our virtual and physicalworlds are becoming hybrids. Our buildings are playing
an important role in our daily life and our emotions.
In this concept, the buildings are becoming robots andcommunicate with us through their own gestures. Basedon these ideas, they create an aluminium robot that is
static like a tower structure at the beginning. However, as
people draw closer, it appears to be a living and sociable
creature that comes to life. Robot’s movements areuncanny, like a human in motion, but inhuman in form.
The audience that comes across with this performative
installation, questioning how the perception of theinteraction is important in the way that we are related toour physical and virtual worlds to the further side of formand scale.
This work expresses many of the ideas that we developed
above, such as Donna Haraway’s cyborg, a hybrid entity or
environment. It is a machine- an actor is a system- that isdependent but also equal to the human actants that are27part of the system. This project is interested in my practicebecause examines the design of kinetic and performativearchitecture, creating a robot that interacts with theaudience through gestures and co-create with the humanperformers.

Figure 8: Ruairi Glynn, Motive
Colloquies, 2011

Omnia p e r O m n i aThis project (Figure 9) by Sougwen Chung is a painting
performance by the artist and a robotic swarm. Its
topic is connected to the flow of a city. Specifically, thisproject “reimagines the tradition of landscape painting
as a collaboration between an artist, a robotic swarm,
and the dynamic flow of a city”. Sougwen investigates
different oppositions such as physical and mechanical or
improvisational and computational. She collaborates witha swarm of custom-designed drawing robots, creating adrawing collaborative performance with multiple agencies
of a human and machine, complex relations and plural
identities. It is also originated from a really interesting
research about surveillance systems which is very well
documented and offers insight into a debate, asking
questions like “Are we at the onset of a new, collaborative
imagination - of radical new intersubjectivities? What doesit mean to collaborate with the spaces we inhabit, the tools
we build? Where does ‘I’ end and ‘we’ begin?”.
Sougwen’s project is not related to dancing performances
but it expresses the same norms of imposing creativity
and agency in machines and in human-robot co-creation
with my work.
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The robots seem like respect their human partner andshe also shares the same amount of agency with them.
In this way, they create a harmonic co-performanceas an equal creative entity, forming a kind of team.This
performance depicts Haraway’s concept of naturecultures,
exploring new media that can enrich the non-human view.
It concerns a series of questions for agency, abstraction,subjectivity and non-human processes. Sougwen thinks
beyond dichotomies allowing this coupling of the humansensorium with the non-human worlds.

Figure 9: Sougwen Chung, Omnia
per Omnia, 2018

CONCLUSIONMy research investigates the theoretical ideas of cyborg,
agency, materialism, posthuman philosophies, embodied
intelligence, animism and interaction between different
actors. It looks into the literature of the cyborg andnaturecultures from Donna Haraway, or Kathrine Hayles’
posthuman ideology, and applies the idea of homogeneityin human-machine co-creation in Sougwen’s drawing
performance. Then it exaggerates the notion of assigningagency to a machine, so as to give it the opportunity to
be creative. Looking into the Nyloïd, a robot that moves
similar to a living object, we try to find the techniquesthat we can create machines and make people impose
them human attributes. Some characteristics that echo allof these case studies, is the superiority of the embodied
materiality and physicality of the object and the designof non-anthropomorphic machines. Black flags express
these principles, opposing the classical manifestationsof choreographic thinking. Located in Betti Marenko’s andPhilip van Allen’s animistic design, the last chapter tries
to reimagine interaction and add unpredictability to thecomplexity of the movements of the animated machines.
Ruari Glynn creates ‘alive’ creatures that are human inmotion, but inhuman in form and develop complex
interaction with the audience and the human performers.
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I have gained different principles to take forward for myartistic practice, such as opposing dualism and inequalities
and using techniques that seem like giving agency andunpredictability to non-human forms. Also, I am really
impressed by the idea of materiality and space cognitionof the objects, contrast to digital intelligence. In the context
of dancing, my goal is to create a robotic form that I will
be able to co-create with and learn from it, exploring newinteresting relationships between the human and themachine.
Setting criteria for the success of a performative project
like that would be the participation of people in theperformance and their expression of interest for arisingquestions and debate for the subject. Where is the line
between human and non-human in this context? Is
there any hierarchy? They are made of us, but they areautomated. Perhaps the most significant criterion ofevaluation is to bring discussion about what an ‘alive’machine is or what it could become in the future and also
if we want to live with one.
On the other hand, I found out the problematics in the useof the terms of aliveness, creativity and intelligence.

“A robot is a cultural construct, with much of what it
is and what it can do arising from the human culturalenvironment, rather than the robot itself” (Gemeinboeck,
Saunders, 2015). Maybe we should consider the fact that
we impose creativity on a machine because of cultural andperceptual factors. Through my practice, I want to explore
how I can visualize my hypothesis about assigning agency
and randomness to a machine and make it look alive, so
as to co-create with a human entity. Is the robot bringing
something new to the performance? Additionally, in termsof agency, the distinction of who is responding to whomis going to be complicated and difficult to reveal.

and self-organizing machines or machine learningalgorithms, neural networks and artificial intelligent
agents. Nevertheless, it is important to acknowledge that
all these sophisticated machines, are biased and resultof human programming. But we can discuss further anddesign interesting connections and interactions with theseconvincingly ‘alive’ robots. Instead of looking at them astools, we can try to face them as equal collaborators andsee what new creative ideas we can develop with them.

My next steps are to experiment and explore the inherent
liveness of my creation. We have the tendency to attributepersonality to devices because it is easier with this way
to explain behaviour. As a result, the aesthetic choices of
the robot are important. It is going to be a machine that
doesn’t have a human form, but an abstract mechanicalone. The complex movement is going to come from thestructure of the object and the digital algorithm that runs
behind the robot.
My work aims to create debate, uncertainty and empathyfor ‘alive’ machines, without creating an idolatry for them,but setting the principles for collaboration and potentialityof interaction with these entities. This research
can be extended in terms of autonomous, autopoietic
32

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