Have you ever wondered what it is like to be a chair? Now is your chance to find out! By combining their expertise in telepresence and furniture robotics the artist tried to answer this question in this brand-new technological experience. By using found objects and motors, microcontrollers and VR glasses, it is now possible to see and move through the world as a chair.
Unconventional Self / Werner van der Zwan, Charl Linssen , Photo: Werner van der Zwan, Charl Linssen
Werner van der Zwan (NL), Charl Linssen (NL)
Werner van der Zwan is a Dutch artist and filmmaker living and working in Rotterdam. In his artistic practice he investigates how a sense of life can be created in the non-living by creating moving limbs and body parts in objects with electric motors from the scrapyard and programming. In performances and installations, found objects are given a last breath expressing their distinct character to bridge the inner worlds of things and humans.
Charl Linssen is particularly interested in computer simulation of dynamical processes that unfold over time. The brain is such a dynamic system, and is moreover involved in continuous feedback with its environment, mediated by the body through perception and action. In his spare time, Charl uses electronics and robotics to build objects that exhibit a similar kind of responsiveness to their environment. These objects have a quality of “animatedness”, or being endowed with a spirit, in the sense that they are not just objects like any other, but rather come to life once the circuit is powered on.