Transcript for Colmena

The Electronic Life Forms project started in 2004 by a workshop with Ralf Schreiber and Strudel.org where we worked on analog robots

at the Academy of Media Art in Cologne

So then we started to think about electronic life forms, artificial life

what is artificial life, how can you build artificial life and what's important

and what are important principles for artificial life.

So we started to solder little robots, which are really simple

analog creatures and circuits

they produce sound and movement

and are totally fed by solar light

so they are autarkic in a way

that they start when the sun goes up and they stop when the sun goes down

The Colmena project will be about 100 creatures, handknitted

handknitted wire in cylindrical forms

this will be the nest of the creatures and keep them protected from the weather

the solar cells will be outside

and catch the sunlight, and underneath there is a small motor

that creates the movement of the electronic circuit

and there are some piezo speakers coming outside of the creatures

or the nest, which recreate the sound of the creatures.

so we will hang them underneath trees

in the whole park, and there will be two big swarms

a big one and a smaller one, and some solo creatures in some other spots in the park as well

so it's kind of an invasion of the creatures of the Miró park.

When we received the invitation to participate in this award competition

we started to do some research about the work of Miró

and our work, and found some parallels

of course, we have been familiar with his paintings

and his graphical work, but less with his sculptural work

So that was very inspiring for us to see

and also to learn what he thought about his work

that he had these pictures in his mind

that maybe at night they would start living, they would explore the nature

and he was very interested in the idea of merging his sculptural work and nature.

So this is pretty much what we thought

could be a nice new edge within the ELF project

so our ELFs are inspired

by his paintings in a formal way

We have an organic, but kind of geometric shape

and at the same time these creatures are very autarkic,

they live by themselves,

so there is no human being involved to make them alive

and this is what we think was in Miró's mind

when he was thinking about his sculptures and his work.