"RNR Project" by Patrick Tresset

Patrick Tresset is a Brussels-based artist who, in his work, explores human traits and the aspects of human experience. He is best known for his performative installations using robotic agents as stylized actors that make marks and for his exploration of the drawing practice using computational systems and robots.

In the award-winning "Human Study #1" series of performative installations, a human is drawn live by several robots during a 20-minute session. Both audiences and participants often mention the robot’s attention as a striking element. Tresset has been researching a forthcoming series of installations for the past three years, including developing a new robot (RNR). Instead of being strongly influenced by human behaviour that is perceived as familiar like the human study #1 robots, he is exploring ways to make it [RNR] perceived as alien, unfamiliar, and foreign.

The "RNR" is an intermediary work, where he will specifically explore how having a robot looking at us with a different unfamiliar perceptual system affects our perception of it. As an animal, if attention is directed toward us, it needs to be evaluated instantly: can we eat it? Is it going to eat us? As humans, the way we are observed triggers a wealth of emotions. What if we can’t decode the intention of the observer? And what will the robot draw if it sees differently? The aim for the final installation would be for the emotions in the human being drawn during ten-minute performances to progressively move from unsettled to intrigued, reassured, captivated, and charmed.

This project has been awarded with the ISEA2022 Barcelona Grant by .Beep Collection and NewArtFoundation.

It will be presented at the CCCB as part of the exhibition Brain(s), from July 26 to December 11 2022.