“MA-1” by Stephen Hamper
Title:
- MA-1
Artist(s) and People Involved:
Exhibiting Artist(s):
Symposium:
Artist Statement:
An industrial robot — with neither face, nor legs, and only arms and hands that move and manipulate objects — is the direct outcome of functional design. Fixed steadfast to is predetermined program on the factory floor, the robot solicits very little emotion from the observer. The machine has no interest in you and is therefore unlikely to arouse affection. MA-1 is interested in you. Its primary function is to respond to you. MA-1 waits for you.
We often find an uncanny feeling when a machine responds to our movement, interpreting our body language. An uneasy sense of life emerges from an inanimate object. Here, movement arises where we anticipate stillness, and stillness where we expect movement.
