Future Mobility Lounge was a talk and workshop event on future mobility and sustainability, jointly organized by Hyundai Mobility Japan, which is Hyundai Motor Company’s Japanese subsidiary, and the Ars Electronica Futurelab. It was held on October 28 and 29, 2022, at the Hyundai Customer Experience Center in Yokohama, Japan, in a unique event format that included a demonstration of Boston Dynamics’ robot Spot. Boston Dynamics is an affiliated company of Hyundai Motor Company.

The talk session on the first day of the event deepened the question, “What will mobility of the future look like?” It focused on the need for artistic and cultural mobility technologies, how to design future mobility using AI and other cutting-edge technologies, as well as the need for sustainable mobility. 

Speakers included Matthew Knights (Boston Dynamics), Kyoko Kunoh (Artist/Ambassador, Ars Electronica), Hideaki Ogawa (Co-Director, Ars Electronica Futurelab), Takao Urabe (Team Leader, Hyundai Mobility Japan R&D Center Design Team), and the moderator was Hidemi Ichinose (Hyundai Mobility Japan Marketing Team).

On the second day, Kyoko Kunoh and Hideaki Ogawa of the Ars Electronica Futurelab discussed future mobility through a “Hybrid Workshop” designed by the lab. Here, elementary school participants and their parents worked together to conceptualize new mobility ideas by combining Spot with various objects: from home appliances to commodities as well as things found in nature like animals, trees and fruit – creating entirely new mobility ideas in the process. 

The unexpected cross-inspiration catalysed by the Hybrid Workshop allowed the participants to fundamentally question the future of mobility and discuss the possibilities of mobility suitable for the people, society, and global environment that will be needed in the future.

Watch the talk session “What will mobility of the future look like?” (in Japanese):

Ars Electronica Futurelab: Kyoko Kunoh, Nicolas Naveau, Hideaki Ogawa

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Interested in similar projects? The following Ars Electronica Futurelab projects are related to the ideas and concepts presented here. An overview of all our productions, cooperations and projects can be found in our project archive.