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Rob Saunders

Leiden University, Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science, Faculty Member

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My primary research interest is the development of computational models of creativity. The development of computational models of creative processes provides opportunities for developing a better understanding human creativity, producing tools that support human creativity and possibly creating autonomous systems capable of creative activity. My approach to developing computational models of creativity is to develop curious agents and to use these curious agents to simulate creative systems.

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George Mason University

Gabriela Goldschmidt

Technion Israel Institute of Technology

Salvatore Gaglio

Dmitri Rachkovskij

International Research and Training Center for Information Technologies and Systems of Ukraine and Ministry of Education of Ukraine

City, University of London

Christian Derix

Merideth Gattis

Cardiff University

Tufts University

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Papers by Rob Saunders

Interpretation-driven Visual Association

ICCC, 2011

In this paper we outline ongoing research into a computational model of association based on the ... more In this paper we outline ongoing research into a computational model of association based on the reinterpretation of a source object to fit the target. We describe the structure of the model and the concepts from which it arises. Preliminary results of visual associations made by the system in a simple shape domain are presented. We also discuss a planned application of our model to the analysis of a real-world creative design.

Towards a Computational Model of Creative Cultures

National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, 2008

This paper examines the possibility for developing a computational model of creative systems that... more This paper examines the possibility for developing a computational model of creative systems that supports the evolution of language in creative cultures. First we present some previous work developing models of creative individuals and creative societies. The extension of these earlier models towards a model of creative cultures is discussed with particular emphasis on the modelling of the evolution of language in creative domains using "language games." The model presented here extends the previous work with the potential for incorporating aspects of the cultural situation that affect the production, evaluation and adoption of creative works. We conclude with a discussion of the potential significance of developing language capable multi-agent systems for the modelling of creative cultures. Creative behaviour is personally, socially and culturally situated: creative individuals work within environments rich with personal experiences, social relationships and accumulated cultural knowledge. The majority of computational models of creativity have focussed on the cognitive and individual levels of the creative process, some work has begun to model social factors but little work has attempted to model creativity within a cultural environment. Developing models that incorporate a cultural component will allow the affects of culture on creative development to be studied in simulation-potentially creating new tools for the study and support of creativity. Traditionally, computational models of creativity have focussed on capturing individualistic, or cognitive, aspects by modelling the creative process as generative systems, e.g., models of anology-making . Often these have been developed based on Newell & Simon's characterization of creativity as problem-solving , however, as some commentators have pointed out, creative individuals can be distinguished as much by their ability to find new problems as by their capacity to solve problems posed by others . Studies of human creativity has revealed the importance of the social and cultural environment for creative individu-

Interpretation-driven mapping: A framework for conducting search and rerepresentation in parallel for computational analogy in design

Artificial intelligence for engineering design, analysis and manufacturing, Apr 27, 2015

This paper presents a framework for the interactions between the processes of mapping and re-repr... more This paper presents a framework for the interactions between the processes of mapping and re-representation within analogy-making. Developing analogical reasoning systems for use in design tasks requires representations that are fluid and open to reinterpreting. The framework, Interpretation Driven Mapping, casts the process of constructing an analogical relationship as requiring iterative, parallel interactions between mapping and representation. This paper argues that this interpretation-driven approach focusses research on a fundamental problem in analogy-making: how do the representations that make new mappings possible emerge during the mapping process? The framework is useful for both describing existing analogy-making models and designing future ones. The paper presents the development of a computational model informed by the framework, Idiom, that learns ways to reinterpret the representations of objects as it attempts to map between them. In order to demonstrate its feasibility, the results of an implementation of the Idiom model in the domain of visual analogy are presented. Several analogies constructed by the system are presented as examples. The Interpretation Driven Mapping framework is then used to compare representational change in Idiom and three previously published systems. Symbolic, hybrid and connectionist models of analogical mapping differ widely in the ways they represent and solve analogical problems, but the framework is used to elicit the similarities between the ways their representations change. By comparing these three families of analogymaking systems in this way this paper demonstrates that Idiom combines the large scope of possible rerepresentations observed in connectionist approaches with the context-specific guidance observed in hybrid and symbolic approaches.

Learning how to reinterpret creative problems

ICCC, 2013

This paper discusses a method, implemented in the domain of computational association, by which c... more This paper discusses a method, implemented in the domain of computational association, by which computational creative systems could learn from their previous experiences and apply them to influence their future behaviour, even on creative problems that differ significantly from those encountered before. The approach is based on learning ways that problems can be reinterpreted. These interpretations may then be applicable to other problems in ways that specific solutions or object knowledge may not. We demonstrate a simple proof-ofconcept of this approach in the domain of simple visual association, and discuss how and why this behaviour could be integrated into other creative systems.

Designing for Interest and Novelty Motivating Design Agents

The Digital Clockwork Muse: A Computational Model of Aesthetic Evolution

A Computational Model of Novelty-Seeking Behaviour in Design

Representational affordances and creativity in association-based systems

ICCC, 2012

This paper describes ongoing research into associationbased computational creative systems. The n... more This paper describes ongoing research into associationbased computational creative systems. The necessary components for developing association-based creative systems are outlined, and the challenges in measuring the creativity of such a system are discussed. An approach to operationalising creativity metrics for association-based systems based on representational affordances is described. This approach is then demonstrated through an analysis of results produced by a system for constructing associations between visual designs.

Issues of Authenticity in Autonomously Creative Systems

ICCC, 2018

As the value of computer generated artefacts increases, we need to question how creative software... more As the value of computer generated artefacts increases, we need to question how creative software will fit into human culture, both as creative collaborators and autonomously creative entities. We hypothesise that, in certain contexts where creative software has increased or total autonomy, lack of authenticity will be a major limiting factor for creative systems in the arts and possibly elsewhere. After explaining and motivating this hypothesis, we study notions of authenticity in the human context and use this to raise issues of computational authenticity. We propose a number of ways to address these issues, including influencing public perception of creative software, practical approaches to software recording and using its life experiences, and employing alternative methodologies for building creative systems. We believe that identifying, exploring and addressing issues of authenticity will help to maximise the beneficial contributions that autonomously creative software can bring to society.

A Parameter-Space Design Methodology for Casual Creators

Casual creators are creativity support tools intended to be fun and easy to use for exploratory c... more Casual creators are creativity support tools intended to be fun and easy to use for exploratory creation. We have built casual creators called fluidic game designers, which support exploratory game design directly on mobile devices. These work by encoding games in a parameterised design space and enabling player/designers to create new games by varying the parameters in a design interface and seeing changes in their design instantly. A question largely unanswered by existing work is how to choose a suitable parameter space. We describe a methodology for specifying and implementing parameterised design spaces for casual creators, a context that requires balancing a large and expressive space against a manageable and fun user interface. This methodology was derived through investigating and generalising how the parameter spaces for three fluidic games were conceived. It suggests an iterative process whereby parameters are sourced in seven different ways, within a dynamic of incrementa...

Rob | Arch 2012

Interplay of scripts and resistance in a participatory workshop

Investigating the Potential for Shared Agency using Enactive Interfaces

New Interfaces for Musical Expression, 2010

Human agency, our capacity for action, has been at the hub of discussions centring upon philosoph... more Human agency, our capacity for action, has been at the hub of discussions centring upon philosophical enquiry for a long period of time. Sensory supplementation devices can provide us with unique opportunities to investigate the different aspects of our agency by enabling new modes of perception and facilitating the emergence of novel interactions, all of which is impossible without the aforesaid devices. Our preliminary study investigates the non-verbal strategies employed for negotiation of our capacity for action with other bodies and the surrounding space through body-to-body and body-to-space couplings enabled by sensory supplementation devices. We employed a lowfi rapid prototyping approach to build this device, enabling distal perception by sonic and haptic feedback. Further, we conducted a workshop in which participants equipped with this device engaged in game-like activities.

Performative Body Mapping for Designing Expressive Robots

ICCC, 2018

This paper explores the challenges and opportunities of skill acquisition for creative robotics, ... more This paper explores the challenges and opportunities of skill acquisition for creative robotics, where the required knowledge is highly embodied. We present Performative Body Mapping (PBM) as a suitable methodology for harnessing the movement expertise of trained professionals. We describe the results from a series of workshops to design and train a non-humanlike robot through embodied explorations of possible forms and movements. In addition to the PBM methodology, we propose a method for evaluating expressive robot performers by adapting the Godspeed questionnaire, commonly used in social robotics, which gathers audience feedback on the perception of five properties of interest in creative robotics; anthropomorphism, affective agency, intelligibility, perceived intelligence, and perceived originality. We report on some preliminary results from a first audience study of an early prototype of our robot and discuss the implications for our research.

Enabling new forms of agency using wearable environments

Technological artefacts can mediate the relations between humans and the environment: mediation c... more Technological artefacts can mediate the relations between humans and the environment: mediation changes our agency, which can be defined as our capacity for action. There can be different types of technological mediation and each type shapes our agency differently. Our model of wearable environments, which combines wearable computing and smart environment approaches, is useful for exploring new types of relations and, by extension, new forms of agency. In this paper, we present the first stage of developing a wearable environment system involving a series of workshops using two prototype devices. We evaluated the workshop activities according to a postphenomenological account: this has allowed us to analyse the transformation of machine-mediated agency vis-à-vis two dimensions: perception and praxis. Our findings showed that interpretations of sonic and tactile feedback were highly dependent upon the placement of the sensing and effecting capacities of the system.

FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete

The Fibreculture Journal, Oct 1, 2011

FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete. ... more FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete. '… unceasingly we are bombarded with pseudorealities manufactured by very sophisticated people using very sophisticated electronic mechanisms. I do not distrust their motives; I distrust their power. They have a lot of it. And it is an astonishing power: that of creating whole universes, universes of the mind. I ought to know. I do the same thing. … However, I will reveal a secret to you: I like to build universes that do fall apart.'-Philip K. Dick (1995: 262) One of the most curious characteristics of computing processes and the medium of the digital is that they evoke, reinforce, produce and nourish two disparate positions of understanding us and the world: the reductionist, generalised and objective; and, the situated, partial and multiple. The first looks at and constructs the world in terms of what is known and can be described, while the latter embraces the unknown, uncertain and messy. Often, the two polarise along the border between objective knowledge, stripped of its body and deprived of our bodies, and situated knowledges, emerging from embodied processes and enacted, experienced or known in embodied ways. In this article, we will explore how the latter, the situated, indeterminable, always partial, is produced and made tangible by digital processes, and how these processes always unfold in-and rely on-embodied, specific and experiential conditions. As researchers, working across digital media, installation and computational creativity, we encounter, think, and experiment with these processes through our creative practice. Like Philip K. Dick, we, too, like to build realities that are unstable. The discussion will revolve around the specifics of four installations: two, so-called, virtual environments, Uzume and Maya-Veil of Illusion, and two robotic environments, On Track and Zwischenräume. [1] [2] [3] [4].

Dancing with the Nonhuman

We propose that feminist reconceptualisations of agency and difference could dramatically expand ... more We propose that feminist reconceptualisations of agency and difference could dramatically expand our possibilities for both relating to robots in social scenarios and designing them as social agents. A performative approach to human-robot interaction favors the artefact's relational, participatory capacities over representational attributes to explore the meaning-making potential of human-machine couplings rather than the predefined meaning of an individual robotic agent. We discuss the feminist concepts of intra-action and diffraction and explore how they could expand our understanding of the workings of the interference patterns that characterize human-robot relationships. Our collaborative Machine Movement Lab project serves as a case study to look at the situated enactment of the subjects and objects that shape our human-robot relationships through the embodied lens of performance-making. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Interface design prototyping; • Computer systems organization → Robotics.

Encounters at the fringe

Routledge eBooks, Nov 29, 2021

The Machine as Autonomous Performer

Springer eBooks, 2014

In this chapter we explore the experience of interactive system-based artworks that exhibit auton... more In this chapter we explore the experience of interactive system-based artworks that exhibit autonomous behaviours in an interactive context. Engaging with such autonomously behaving works opens up experiences that are more akin to conversing, performing, or negotiating. We introduce cybernetic influences and take a closer look at the performance of the participant/machine system. Following this, we discuss the ways in which artists approach working with adaptive systems and observe audiences to iteratively improve their system designs. At the core of the chapter is a discussion of five artworks that serve as our case studies: two influential works: Edward Ihnatowicz's The Senster and Ken Rinaldo's Autopoiesis, and three projects developed by the authors: Uzume, Accomplice, and Zamyatin. We use these case studies to explore the artists' approach to autonomy, how it shapes the audience's experience and the methods used in the development and evaluative process. 1 Such complexity, for example, may be captured by the formalisation of digital art systems by Cornock and Edmonds (1973), including the category 'dynamic interactive (varying)' in which the conditions of interaction change over time. The works described here are most likely to fit this category, but may achieve a complexity of interaction by other means than devising mechanisms for long-term variation.

Moving beyond the mirror: relational and performative meaning making in human–robot communication

AI & society, Jun 16, 2021

Current research in human-robot interaction often focuses on rendering communication between huma... more Current research in human-robot interaction often focuses on rendering communication between humans and robots more 'natural' by designing machines that appear and behave humanlike. Communication, in this human-centric approach, is often understood as a process of successfully transmitting information in the form of predefined messages and gestures. This article introduces an alternative arts-led, movement-centric approach, which embraces the differences of machinelike robotic artefacts and, instead, investigates how meaning is dynamically enacted in the encounter of humans and machines. Our design approach revolves around a novel embodied mapping methodology, which serves to bridge between human-machine asymmetries and socioculturally situate abstract robotic artefacts. Building on concepts from performativity, material agency, enactive sense-making and kinaesthetic empathy, our Machine Movement Lab project opens up a performative-relational model of human-machine communication, where meaning is generated through relational dynamics in the interaction itself.

Interpretation-driven Visual Association

ICCC, 2011

In this paper we outline ongoing research into a computational model of association based on the ... more In this paper we outline ongoing research into a computational model of association based on the reinterpretation of a source object to fit the target. We describe the structure of the model and the concepts from which it arises. Preliminary results of visual associations made by the system in a simple shape domain are presented. We also discuss a planned application of our model to the analysis of a real-world creative design.

Towards a Computational Model of Creative Cultures

National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, 2008

This paper examines the possibility for developing a computational model of creative systems that... more This paper examines the possibility for developing a computational model of creative systems that supports the evolution of language in creative cultures. First we present some previous work developing models of creative individuals and creative societies. The extension of these earlier models towards a model of creative cultures is discussed with particular emphasis on the modelling of the evolution of language in creative domains using "language games." The model presented here extends the previous work with the potential for incorporating aspects of the cultural situation that affect the production, evaluation and adoption of creative works. We conclude with a discussion of the potential significance of developing language capable multi-agent systems for the modelling of creative cultures. Creative behaviour is personally, socially and culturally situated: creative individuals work within environments rich with personal experiences, social relationships and accumulated cultural knowledge. The majority of computational models of creativity have focussed on the cognitive and individual levels of the creative process, some work has begun to model social factors but little work has attempted to model creativity within a cultural environment. Developing models that incorporate a cultural component will allow the affects of culture on creative development to be studied in simulation-potentially creating new tools for the study and support of creativity. Traditionally, computational models of creativity have focussed on capturing individualistic, or cognitive, aspects by modelling the creative process as generative systems, e.g., models of anology-making . Often these have been developed based on Newell & Simon's characterization of creativity as problem-solving , however, as some commentators have pointed out, creative individuals can be distinguished as much by their ability to find new problems as by their capacity to solve problems posed by others . Studies of human creativity has revealed the importance of the social and cultural environment for creative individu-

Interpretation-driven mapping: A framework for conducting search and rerepresentation in parallel for computational analogy in design

Artificial intelligence for engineering design, analysis and manufacturing, Apr 27, 2015

This paper presents a framework for the interactions between the processes of mapping and re-repr... more This paper presents a framework for the interactions between the processes of mapping and re-representation within analogy-making. Developing analogical reasoning systems for use in design tasks requires representations that are fluid and open to reinterpreting. The framework, Interpretation Driven Mapping, casts the process of constructing an analogical relationship as requiring iterative, parallel interactions between mapping and representation. This paper argues that this interpretation-driven approach focusses research on a fundamental problem in analogy-making: how do the representations that make new mappings possible emerge during the mapping process? The framework is useful for both describing existing analogy-making models and designing future ones. The paper presents the development of a computational model informed by the framework, Idiom, that learns ways to reinterpret the representations of objects as it attempts to map between them. In order to demonstrate its feasibility, the results of an implementation of the Idiom model in the domain of visual analogy are presented. Several analogies constructed by the system are presented as examples. The Interpretation Driven Mapping framework is then used to compare representational change in Idiom and three previously published systems. Symbolic, hybrid and connectionist models of analogical mapping differ widely in the ways they represent and solve analogical problems, but the framework is used to elicit the similarities between the ways their representations change. By comparing these three families of analogymaking systems in this way this paper demonstrates that Idiom combines the large scope of possible rerepresentations observed in connectionist approaches with the context-specific guidance observed in hybrid and symbolic approaches.

Learning how to reinterpret creative problems

ICCC, 2013

This paper discusses a method, implemented in the domain of computational association, by which c... more This paper discusses a method, implemented in the domain of computational association, by which computational creative systems could learn from their previous experiences and apply them to influence their future behaviour, even on creative problems that differ significantly from those encountered before. The approach is based on learning ways that problems can be reinterpreted. These interpretations may then be applicable to other problems in ways that specific solutions or object knowledge may not. We demonstrate a simple proof-ofconcept of this approach in the domain of simple visual association, and discuss how and why this behaviour could be integrated into other creative systems.

Designing for Interest and Novelty Motivating Design Agents

The Digital Clockwork Muse: A Computational Model of Aesthetic Evolution

A Computational Model of Novelty-Seeking Behaviour in Design

Representational affordances and creativity in association-based systems

ICCC, 2012

This paper describes ongoing research into associationbased computational creative systems. The n... more This paper describes ongoing research into associationbased computational creative systems. The necessary components for developing association-based creative systems are outlined, and the challenges in measuring the creativity of such a system are discussed. An approach to operationalising creativity metrics for association-based systems based on representational affordances is described. This approach is then demonstrated through an analysis of results produced by a system for constructing associations between visual designs.

Issues of Authenticity in Autonomously Creative Systems

ICCC, 2018

As the value of computer generated artefacts increases, we need to question how creative software... more As the value of computer generated artefacts increases, we need to question how creative software will fit into human culture, both as creative collaborators and autonomously creative entities. We hypothesise that, in certain contexts where creative software has increased or total autonomy, lack of authenticity will be a major limiting factor for creative systems in the arts and possibly elsewhere. After explaining and motivating this hypothesis, we study notions of authenticity in the human context and use this to raise issues of computational authenticity. We propose a number of ways to address these issues, including influencing public perception of creative software, practical approaches to software recording and using its life experiences, and employing alternative methodologies for building creative systems. We believe that identifying, exploring and addressing issues of authenticity will help to maximise the beneficial contributions that autonomously creative software can bring to society.

A Parameter-Space Design Methodology for Casual Creators

Casual creators are creativity support tools intended to be fun and easy to use for exploratory c... more Casual creators are creativity support tools intended to be fun and easy to use for exploratory creation. We have built casual creators called fluidic game designers, which support exploratory game design directly on mobile devices. These work by encoding games in a parameterised design space and enabling player/designers to create new games by varying the parameters in a design interface and seeing changes in their design instantly. A question largely unanswered by existing work is how to choose a suitable parameter space. We describe a methodology for specifying and implementing parameterised design spaces for casual creators, a context that requires balancing a large and expressive space against a manageable and fun user interface. This methodology was derived through investigating and generalising how the parameter spaces for three fluidic games were conceived. It suggests an iterative process whereby parameters are sourced in seven different ways, within a dynamic of incrementa...

Rob | Arch 2012

Interplay of scripts and resistance in a participatory workshop

Investigating the Potential for Shared Agency using Enactive Interfaces

New Interfaces for Musical Expression, 2010

Human agency, our capacity for action, has been at the hub of discussions centring upon philosoph... more Human agency, our capacity for action, has been at the hub of discussions centring upon philosophical enquiry for a long period of time. Sensory supplementation devices can provide us with unique opportunities to investigate the different aspects of our agency by enabling new modes of perception and facilitating the emergence of novel interactions, all of which is impossible without the aforesaid devices. Our preliminary study investigates the non-verbal strategies employed for negotiation of our capacity for action with other bodies and the surrounding space through body-to-body and body-to-space couplings enabled by sensory supplementation devices. We employed a lowfi rapid prototyping approach to build this device, enabling distal perception by sonic and haptic feedback. Further, we conducted a workshop in which participants equipped with this device engaged in game-like activities.

Performative Body Mapping for Designing Expressive Robots

ICCC, 2018

This paper explores the challenges and opportunities of skill acquisition for creative robotics, ... more This paper explores the challenges and opportunities of skill acquisition for creative robotics, where the required knowledge is highly embodied. We present Performative Body Mapping (PBM) as a suitable methodology for harnessing the movement expertise of trained professionals. We describe the results from a series of workshops to design and train a non-humanlike robot through embodied explorations of possible forms and movements. In addition to the PBM methodology, we propose a method for evaluating expressive robot performers by adapting the Godspeed questionnaire, commonly used in social robotics, which gathers audience feedback on the perception of five properties of interest in creative robotics; anthropomorphism, affective agency, intelligibility, perceived intelligence, and perceived originality. We report on some preliminary results from a first audience study of an early prototype of our robot and discuss the implications for our research.

Enabling new forms of agency using wearable environments

Technological artefacts can mediate the relations between humans and the environment: mediation c... more Technological artefacts can mediate the relations between humans and the environment: mediation changes our agency, which can be defined as our capacity for action. There can be different types of technological mediation and each type shapes our agency differently. Our model of wearable environments, which combines wearable computing and smart environment approaches, is useful for exploring new types of relations and, by extension, new forms of agency. In this paper, we present the first stage of developing a wearable environment system involving a series of workshops using two prototype devices. We evaluated the workshop activities according to a postphenomenological account: this has allowed us to analyse the transformation of machine-mediated agency vis-à-vis two dimensions: perception and praxis. Our findings showed that interpretations of sonic and tactile feedback were highly dependent upon the placement of the sensing and effecting capacities of the system.

FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete

The Fibreculture Journal, Oct 1, 2011

FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete. ... more FCJ-120 Other Ways Of Knowing: Embodied Investigations of the Unstable, Slippery and Incomplete. '… unceasingly we are bombarded with pseudorealities manufactured by very sophisticated people using very sophisticated electronic mechanisms. I do not distrust their motives; I distrust their power. They have a lot of it. And it is an astonishing power: that of creating whole universes, universes of the mind. I ought to know. I do the same thing. … However, I will reveal a secret to you: I like to build universes that do fall apart.'-Philip K. Dick (1995: 262) One of the most curious characteristics of computing processes and the medium of the digital is that they evoke, reinforce, produce and nourish two disparate positions of understanding us and the world: the reductionist, generalised and objective; and, the situated, partial and multiple. The first looks at and constructs the world in terms of what is known and can be described, while the latter embraces the unknown, uncertain and messy. Often, the two polarise along the border between objective knowledge, stripped of its body and deprived of our bodies, and situated knowledges, emerging from embodied processes and enacted, experienced or known in embodied ways. In this article, we will explore how the latter, the situated, indeterminable, always partial, is produced and made tangible by digital processes, and how these processes always unfold in-and rely on-embodied, specific and experiential conditions. As researchers, working across digital media, installation and computational creativity, we encounter, think, and experiment with these processes through our creative practice. Like Philip K. Dick, we, too, like to build realities that are unstable. The discussion will revolve around the specifics of four installations: two, so-called, virtual environments, Uzume and Maya-Veil of Illusion, and two robotic environments, On Track and Zwischenräume. [1] [2] [3] [4].

Dancing with the Nonhuman

We propose that feminist reconceptualisations of agency and difference could dramatically expand ... more We propose that feminist reconceptualisations of agency and difference could dramatically expand our possibilities for both relating to robots in social scenarios and designing them as social agents. A performative approach to human-robot interaction favors the artefact's relational, participatory capacities over representational attributes to explore the meaning-making potential of human-machine couplings rather than the predefined meaning of an individual robotic agent. We discuss the feminist concepts of intra-action and diffraction and explore how they could expand our understanding of the workings of the interference patterns that characterize human-robot relationships. Our collaborative Machine Movement Lab project serves as a case study to look at the situated enactment of the subjects and objects that shape our human-robot relationships through the embodied lens of performance-making. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Interface design prototyping; • Computer systems organization → Robotics.

Encounters at the fringe

Routledge eBooks, Nov 29, 2021

The Machine as Autonomous Performer

Springer eBooks, 2014

In this chapter we explore the experience of interactive system-based artworks that exhibit auton... more In this chapter we explore the experience of interactive system-based artworks that exhibit autonomous behaviours in an interactive context. Engaging with such autonomously behaving works opens up experiences that are more akin to conversing, performing, or negotiating. We introduce cybernetic influences and take a closer look at the performance of the participant/machine system. Following this, we discuss the ways in which artists approach working with adaptive systems and observe audiences to iteratively improve their system designs. At the core of the chapter is a discussion of five artworks that serve as our case studies: two influential works: Edward Ihnatowicz's The Senster and Ken Rinaldo's Autopoiesis, and three projects developed by the authors: Uzume, Accomplice, and Zamyatin. We use these case studies to explore the artists' approach to autonomy, how it shapes the audience's experience and the methods used in the development and evaluative process. 1 Such complexity, for example, may be captured by the formalisation of digital art systems by Cornock and Edmonds (1973), including the category 'dynamic interactive (varying)' in which the conditions of interaction change over time. The works described here are most likely to fit this category, but may achieve a complexity of interaction by other means than devising mechanisms for long-term variation.

Moving beyond the mirror: relational and performative meaning making in human–robot communication

AI & society, Jun 16, 2021

Current research in human-robot interaction often focuses on rendering communication between huma... more Current research in human-robot interaction often focuses on rendering communication between humans and robots more 'natural' by designing machines that appear and behave humanlike. Communication, in this human-centric approach, is often understood as a process of successfully transmitting information in the form of predefined messages and gestures. This article introduces an alternative arts-led, movement-centric approach, which embraces the differences of machinelike robotic artefacts and, instead, investigates how meaning is dynamically enacted in the encounter of humans and machines. Our design approach revolves around a novel embodied mapping methodology, which serves to bridge between human-machine asymmetries and socioculturally situate abstract robotic artefacts. Building on concepts from performativity, material agency, enactive sense-making and kinaesthetic empathy, our Machine Movement Lab project opens up a performative-relational model of human-machine communication, where meaning is generated through relational dynamics in the interaction itself.

Surveying Stereotomy

by Simon Weir, Shayani Fernando, and Rob Saunders

Architecture Research Centre Consortium (ARCC) Conference Chicago, USA. April6-9 2015