ABRA

Radical Speculations: Artificial Biology and Robotics meet Art and Architecture

Dipoli Gallery, 13.09-09.11.22

The world is getting increasingly complex as new developments, systems and even aesthetics are frequently introduced. While design and creative processes are evolving, new tools and methods, which are often adopted from science and technology, are taken into use in art, design and architecture. These diverse developments are also impacting manufacturing, industries, urban habitats, design approaches and the arts in the expanded field. We believe that a disciplinary, tool- and solution-oriented approach towards the current and future global challenges will not be enough. 

The ABRA project is dealing with complex problems, focusing on a fundamental shift in approaching grand challenges through novel combinations of currently disconnected fields of knowledge and ways of working. The project is provoking and beautiful at the same time.

The project is part of an ongoing international research Erasmus+ project, aiming for novel, transdisciplinary ways of working and educating within a novel composition of fields: artificial biology, robotics, art and architecture. This project cultivates transdisciplinary knowledge and capacity building in higher education. 

This exhibition presents first results from the hands-on workshops with students and faculty tackling the skills gaps and mismatches within our disciplines and beyond. In this entanglement, new questions, new ideas, and new solutions are generated. The presented experiments and prototypes demonstrate novel ways of working, focusing on how artificial intelligence can revolutionize artistic and architectural practice, how robots can creatively transform research and industry to propose new ways of viewing and addressing the complex global challenges.

The ongoing project challenges the ambitious strategic agenda of Aalto University through radical ways of approaching art, architecture and design, asking questions in relation to sustainability, and proposing strategies beyond the ordinary. 

What is our future like co-living with complex, robotic and automated systems? What kinds of politics do these developments present - who is included and excluded? How are our aesthetics and thought processes impacted by the different approaches?