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Alex Iles, president of the Robot Group, |
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Alex Iles, president of the Robot Group, |
The Robot Group is an Austin-based amalgam of about 50 engineers, computer freaks and artists who are building a national reputation for weird fun, as chronicled in such magazines as Newsweek, Mondo 2000 and Wired.
RG President Alex Iles took time out from a talk by Origin Systems' Richard Gariott near the end of this year's Robofest, April 1 and 2, to reflect on the growth of the event, which he said "is a whole lot more organized" this year than in the past.
"We're in a transitional period," Iles acknowledged on the floor of the Austin City Coliseum. The venue, erstwhile location of city-wide garage sales and gun and knife shows, has a distinctly "metal" feeling that complements Robofest nicely.
Part of the transition that Iles mentioned is occurring as the Robot Group reaches out to other like-minded artistic institutions - such as the Sharir Dance Company.
Director Yakov Sharir said the troupe's collaboration with Robofest is "a natural progression," given the dancers' reputation at the cutting edge of the "multimedia movement" movement.
Sharir, the University of Texas at Austin's in-house modern dance company, created quite a stir last year with its premiere of The Virtual Dervish. In the complex piece, presented only in video format at Robofest 6, company founder Sharir dances simultaneously on stage and in cyberspace as audience members don virtual reality gear to interact with the wild result on a computer screen.
Another popular Sharir-sponsored feature of Robofest 6 was the Singing Floor, a MIDI-based creation of UT's Russell Pinkston. The device uses a Motorola MC68HC11 microprocessor and an coordinate system to translate dance step velocities and pressures into MIDI messages, which it amplifies over a speaker system.
While offering the floor as a playscape for kids and adults during the festival, Sharir and resident choreographer Jose Bustamante also essayed its professional performance possibilities, to the delight of the crowd. Meanwhile, the Robot Group offered a number of its trademark pieces for display and demonstration. Wowing attendees were the fierce Mechanical Pit Bull by Brooks Coleman as well as Tom Giebink's Anti-Gravity Room, a "Salvador Dali-esque" enclosed space whose irregularly shaped floors and walls bend the mind as they seem to bend Cartesian space.
Ominously, up above festivities, a Mylar-covered, radio-controlled blimp, the Mark IV, completed periodic patrols.
Iles said his favorite among new pieces at this year's Robofest was the Mobile Mobile, another creation of Brooks Coleman. Held aloft by a Mylar balloon, the Mobile Mobile uses two lightweight plastic fans to create its own gentle wind currents and twirl in space.
This is the first year that the Robot Group has brought the Sharir troupe into Robofest, which is sponsored by a number of Austin's high-tech and entertainment presences, including Origin Systems and the Austin Circle of Theatres.
Given the individual talents and forward thinking of Sharir and the Robot Group, this hopefully won't be their last collaboration.
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