Can t help myself робот

Работа Дня: Can’t Help Myself от Sun Yuan и Peng Yu

Вторник, Май 5 — 6:34 пп

О работе:

Название: Can’t Help Myself
Художники: Сунь Юань и Пэн Ю
Материалы: Промышленный робот, нержавеющая сталь и резина, эфир целлюлозы в цветной воде, осветительная решетка с датчиками визуального распознавания и акриловая стена с алюминиевой рамой
Размер: 700 x 700 x 500 cm
В коллекции: Музея Соломона Р. Гуггенхайма, Нью-Йорк
Местоположение: Венеция, Италия
Выставка: La Biennale di Venezia

Описание:

Работа Сунь Юаня и Пэн Ю, «Не могу помочь себе» (2016), поднимает вопрос связи человека и машины. «Can’t Help Myself — это метафора, обладающая аллегорической силой рассказывать историю взаимоотношений человечества с технологиями, историю настоящего». — говорит куратор Гуггенхайма Сяоюй Вэн.

Художники «научили» робота выполнять 32 различных движения — от «scratch an itch» до «ass shake» — придавая ему странную, завораживающую человеческую грацию.

В выставочном пространстве мы находим большой роботизированный манипулятор с лопатой на основании. Машина вращается и сгребает к себе вязкую темно-красную жидкость, которая распространяется из-под основания робота. Когда датчики обнаруживают, что жидкость отошла слишком далеко, рука неистово откидывает ее на место. Повторяющиеся сгребания оставляют следы, которые напоминают пятна крови.

Сам робот находится в стеклянной коробке, что напоминает огромное животное в клетке.

На официальном сайте художников написано, что таким образом они пытаются передать идею наблюдения за человеком и военными действиями.

Помимо жизней,принесенных в жертву на ​​войнах, эти механизмы влияют на повседневную жизнь — от камер видеонаблюдения в городских районах до смартфонов.
Когда мы создаем машины и разрабатываем программы для их управления, мы невольно становимся объектами их мониторинга.

Поскольку,технологии становятся все более интегрированными в нашу жизнь, появляется важный вопрос о будующем искусства. Станут ли машины на место человека, либо будут продолжать быть инструментом, который помогает расширить возможности творца.

На этот вопрос у Сунь Юань есть свой ответ: «Даже если машины разработают новую вычислительную мощность, которая превысит их исходные настройки, эти расчеты все равно будут основываться на логике, запрограммированной людьми»

What is the ‘Can’t Help Myself’ art exhibit going viral on TikTok?

A robot art exhibit by artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu, titled ‘Can’t Help Myself,’ is going viral on TikTok, thanks to videos of the machine slowing down after years of being active.

TikTok is home to just about every type of content under the sun, and the whole app is frequently united by huge trends that make waves on the platform, garnering millions of likes and views.

While many are often touched by emotional stories about people, or perhaps animals, the latest thing people are feeling an emotional connection with is actually a robot.

‘Can’t Help Myself’ is a piece by Sun Yuan and Peng Yu that was commissioned for the Guggenheim Museum, and was first installed in 2016.

The exhibit features a robotic arm placed behind clear walls, whose sole purpose is to contain a deep-red liquid within a certain area by scraping it towards itself. As a result, the red liquid gets smeared and splattered across the walls and floor.

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‘Can’t Help Myself’ exhibit goes viral

According to the Guggenheim Museum website, the piece uses “visual-recognition sensors and software systems to examine our increasingly automated global reality, one in which territories are controlled mechanically and the relationship between people and machines is rapidly changing.”

However, as the exhibit was installed in 2016, over the years it began to slow down significantly. This led to it going hugely viral on TikTok, with people feeling sad for the machine.

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“It looks frustrated with itself, like it really wants to be finally done,” one comment with over 350,000 likes reads. “It looks so tired and unmotivated,” another said.

Several videos of the piece have garnered millions of likes and tens of millions of views, and as the clips continue to circulate, there’s no doubt that people will continue giving their interpretations on the exhibit online.

Diggit Magazine

Can’t Help Myself – How a Relatable Robot Offers a Critical Reflection on Modern Society

In 2016, the Guggenheim Museum commissioned its very first robotic artwork called Can’t Help Myself (Wannmann, 2016). The artwork is created by two of China’s most controversial artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu and can be described as a robotic arm that has one specific, life-long duty: to prevent the deep-red, bloodlike liquid, which constantly oozes outwards, from straying too far (Weng, n.d.). By dragging its sweeper across the floor in calculated, almost dance-like movements, the robot brings the liquid back into place over and over again, without it ever seeming to stop. In an effort to clean up the constant mess, the robot only makes matters worse by leaving smudges of the liquid on the floor, the walls, and itself. In the video below, you can see the robot in action. This led to the robot slowing down enormously and eventually being unplugged in 2019. In the end, the robot couldn’t help itself.

In November 2021, the artwork suddenly gained viral attention on the popular video-sharing app TikTok. Short clips of the industrial robot trying to fulfill its life-long duty were sometimes watched over 50 million times and elicited strong emotional reactions among viewers. As the robot’s once smooth movements had grown rusty over time, users sympathized with the machine and its apparent senseless existence. Comments like ‘’it looks so tired and unmotivated,’’ and ‘’Why can’t we just let it rest?’’ appeared plentiful and were liked thousands of times.

In this paper, the many ways in which Sun Yuan and Peng Yu’s artwork Can’t Help Myself can be interpreted will be discussed. The emphasis will be on how the artwork allowed the artists to offer a critical reflection on modern-day issues, such as migration, surveillance, authoritarianism, and even on technology itself. Moreover, the artwork’s virality on TikTok will be taken into account to describe the similarities between the robot’s sad, meaningless life and life in a digital, capitalist-driven society. David Graeber’s notion of ‘bullshit jobs’ will be discussed to reflect on the alienation that comes with doing pointless labor, and how this relates to the robot as well. Lastly, Camus’ reading of the myth of Sisyphus will be considered.

Can’t Help Myself: various Interpretations

Sun Yuan and Peng Yu are often seen as two of China’s most controversial artists and are known for their extreme installations and contemporary conceptual artworks (Ocula, n.d.). Most of their artworks deal with matters relating to death, perception, and the human condition and are often considered to be very confrontational and provocative. The artists’ use of unconventional media, such as machinery, human fat tissue, and even baby cadavers, is intriguing and fascinating to many (Ocula, n.d.). Popular works include the installation Old People’s Home (2008), in which 13 hyper-realistic sculptures of elderly world leaders continuously wander through a small room in electric wheelchairs (Archer, 2019), and the controversial installation Dogs Which Cannot Touch Each Other (2003), where eight dogs are strapped onto treadmills, able only to run forward (Baecker, 2017).

The artwork represents the pain that arises when immigrants are rejected and sent back to their country of origin by governments enforcing their borders.

Just like Sun Yuan and Peng Yu’s other works, Can’t Help Myself is meant to be thought-provoking and confrontational. According to Xiaoyu Weng, associate curator of the Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation at the Guggenheim Museum, the artwork ‘’touches upon many current issues that are urgent in a global context, not only with its robotic characteristic/ materiality but also with its conceptual, socio-political messages.» (Wannmann, 2016). With the robot, the artists were able to offer a critical reflection on modern-day issues, such as migration, surveillance, authoritarianism, and even on technology itself.

It can be argued that the robot of Can’t Help Myself confronts us with issues relating to surveillance, border policing, and authoritarianism. According to Tara McCullough (2020), the work ‘’is intended to represent governments’ attempts at using machinery and modern advances in technology in order to protect themselves and their countries’’. To keep citizens from escaping countries with authoritarian regimes, their governments make use of machinery and new surveillance technologies. Therefore, the robot of Can’t Help Myself represents these governments, and the bloodlike liquid represents their citizens, who are forcefully swept back into their non-free countries after trying to escape. Additionally, the artwork represents the pain that arises when immigrants, who desperately want to be able to build a new life in an unknown country, are rejected and sent back to their country of origin by governments enforcing their borders. In this way, the smudges of bloodlike liquid being left behind by the robot as it performs its task represent the violence that occurs in border zones.

Lastly, Can’t Help Myself questions the place of the machine in contemporary life. As machines, algorithms, and AI can learn and advance more and more on their own, their relationship with humans might change in the future. The possibility of an AI takeover, ‘’a scenario in which artificial intelligence becomes the dominant form of intelligence.’’ (Wikipedia, n.d.), certainly exists. It would leave humans without any control of the planet and themselves, which is why Can’t Help Myself can be interpreted as a critique on today’s use of and dependence on technology. The robot represents the totality of robotic forces, while the bloodlike liquid represents human subjects trying to escape, only to be swept back in and suffer under the control of robots.

Sun Yuan & Peng Yu – Can’t Help Myself

The Robot’s Virality on TikTok

In November 2021, two years after it was unplugged and stopped working, Can’t Help Myself went viral on TikTok. The artwork caused quite the commotion among users and even brought some to tears. Most users sympathized with the robot and its meaningless existence and even felt like they could relate to the robot. They commented their own interpretations of the artwork and connected it to their own digital and labor-driven lives.

In this TikTok, user @2k.kxoll compares the liveliness of the robot’s movements in 2016 and 2019 respectively. The video shows how the robot’s once smooth movements grew rusty over time and how the robot’s liquid-sweeping caused it to leave smudges on the floor, walls, and itself. The eventual encapsulation of the machine in the liquid it was supposed to sweep to the center led to it slowing down enormously. Most commenters find this sad and sympathize with the robot by saying ‘’it looks so tired and unmotivated:(.’’ and ‘’I just want to turn it off to let it ‘rest’». Additionally, the commenters relate to the machine, as they, too, are ‘’continuously cleaning up the pieces of [themselves] as [they] endlessly fall apart, alone, while everyone watches [them] and uses [them] for entertainment’’. The comment ‘’I see myself’’ also shows this relatability, and could mean this commenter, too, has lost their liveliness somewhere along the way and are tired because of the constant, meaningless work they have to do. The robot thus also helps users critically reflect on their own lives.

The robot represents us, as we senselessly spend hours a day watching YouTube videos and liking TikToks, only to realize the meaningless of it when we have already wasted our time.

According to another user, the artwork tells the story of humanity’s relationship with technology. ‘’The robot is just stuck in a loop of nothingness, just like we are by working ourselves to the bone and being on the internet all the time’’, the comment says. On the one hand, technology makes our lives easier. We use the internet to find answers to our pressing questions, we use it to communicate with people from across the globe, and we even use it to do our increasingly digital jobs. On the other hand, we feel trapped by social media and its ability to keep us mindlessly engaged. We are seduced into spending as much time as possible on platforms like Instagram and TikTok, and thus meaninglessly scroll our days away. According to this user then, the robot represents us, as we senselessly spend hours a day watching YouTube videos and liking TikToks, only to realize the meaningless of it when we have already wasted our time. However, as the platforms are made to be so addictive, we cannot stop – we cannot help ourselves. We are all in ‘’a loop of nothingness,’’ that we cannot get out of.

Another commenter also connects the robot’s meaningless endeavor to contain the deep-red liquid to human hardships, as, according to them, ‘’It’s based on how people try to work and help themselves live, but the longer [they] do it the more depressing and painful it gets. No matter how hard [they] try, [they] can never help [themselves]’’. The TikTok user thus points out that, just like the robot, most people only work in order to live and find no meaning in it. The longer we do it, the more depressing it gets. The same counts for the robot; it seemingly gets sadder and sadder during the course of its 3-year-long life, as it just can’t help itself. In the same vein, we humans cannot help ourselves. We are essentially instruments, controlled by capitalist organizations, that cannot escape the meaningless, perpetual labor that comes with living in a capitalist society.

Suffering Through Pointless Labor

David Graeber, anthropologist, and professor at the London School of Economics, similarly argues that millions of us are toiling away in meaningless and pointless jobs, only because it allows us to satisfy our consumer needs in the long run. In his book Bullshit Jobs: A Theory (2019), he defines his notion of ‘bullshit jobs’ as «a form of paid employment that is so completely pointless, unnecessary, or pernicious that even the employee cannot justify its existence even though, as part of the conditions of employment, the employee feels obliged to pretend that this is not the case». Examples of bullshit jobs include receptionists, door attendants, telemarketers, corporate lawyers, quality service managers, and public relations specialists.

The robot offers a critical reflection on how our capitalist structures do not allow us to live life in a meaningful way, just like the robot’s life duty does not allow it to live a life of meaning.

Even though these employees know their job is pointless, they still go to work every day to do the meaningless tasks they are asked to do, as they have no choice but to surrender themselves to the workings of our capitalist-driven society. Based on Graeber, I would construct another interpretation of the artwork: even though the robot knows its efforts are in vain, it still can’t help itself and continues to fulfill its duty every single day. In a way, the robot thus offers a critical reflection on how our capitalist structures do not allow us to live life in a meaningful way, just like the robot’s life duty does not allow it to live a life of meaning.

Additionally, the robot’s endless and pointless endeavor to keep the liquid from straying too far can be compared to the myth of Sisyphus, in which the death-defying hero is condemned to meaningless labor by the gods, for all of eternity. Sisyphus’ endless task consisted of repeatedly rolling a rock up a hill, only to have it roll down again once he got it to the top of the hill (Encyclopaedia Britannica, n.d.). In chapter four of his philosophical essay The Myth of Sisyphus (2021), Albert Camus compares Sisyphus’ fate with that of humans living in a capitalist-driven society. Essentially, humans struggle through pointless labor every day and spend their lives doing the same meaningless tasks, just like Sisyphus did. In the same way, Camus’ reading of the myth of Sisyphus can be connected to the robot of Can’t Help Myself, as it, too, continuously tries to complete its task, only to struggle through the same pointless labor when the liquid oozes outwards again. With the help of Camus, Can’t Help Myself can thus, once again, be interpreted as a critique of the capitalist structures of society.

Sun Yuan & Peng Yu – Can’t Help Myself

Understanding Can’t Help Myself

Can’t Help Myself, like almost any other artwork, can be interpreted in multiple ways. Firstly, it offers a critique of how powerful governments deal with immigration and human life in border zones. Additionally, by comparing the robot, which sweeps a bloodlike liquid back to its center for as long as it lives, to controlling governments, the artists offer a critique on authoritarian regimes that do everything in their power to make sure their citizens cannot escape. Moreover, Can’t Help Myself can be interpreted as a critique on today’s use of and dependence on technology, as we should be careful of a changing relationship between humans and machines that become too knowledgeable.

Furthermore, the artwork’s virality on TikTok led to users feeling a certain relatability and making certain connections between the robot’s endless duty and the hardships that come with living in a digital, capitalist-driven society. According to one commenter, the artwork tells the story of humanity’s relationship with technology, as we ‘’are stuck in a loop of nothingness,’’ by spending hours a day watching YouTube videos and liking TikToks, only to realize the meaningless of it when we have already wasted our time. Another user points out that, just like the robot, most people only work in order to live and find no meaning in it. We cannot escape the meaningless, perpetual labor that comes with living in a capitalist society, just like the robot cannot escape its meaningless task.

Lastly, the robot’s connection to Graeber’s notion of ‘bullshit jobs’ and Camus’ reading of the myth of Sisyphus allows us to interpret the work as a critique on contemporary life, and especially on the meaninglessness of labor. The robot’s constant engagement in pointless labor – as the liquid oozes outwards over and over again, just when the robot has swept it back to its center – can be compared to how we, too, have no choice but to surrender ourselves to pointless jobs, as meaningless labor is at the center of the workings of capitalist society.

References

Camus, A. (2021). Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays. Tingle Books.

Encyclopaedia Britannica. (n.d.). The Myth of Sisyphus | Summary, Analysis, & Facts.

Graeber, D. (2019). Bullshit Jobs: A Theory (1st ed.). Simon & Schuster.

Watching Can’t Help Myself is like looking at a caged animal

The artwork Can’t Help Myself, by Chinese artists Sun Yuan & Peng Yu, is a machine inside of a glass cubicle, illuminated brightly from the ceiling by TL-lights. The machine consists of a robotic arm of the kind that is often used in production lines such as car factories. But this specifically modified arm has only one task: to sweep the liquid, which is dark red and looks like blood, in a perfect circle.

An endlessly task

It is a Sisyphean task because the liquid keeps flowing back. The machine works endlessly on a task that is never finished. This feeling of endless labor is enlarged with the surrounding. The robot is locked inside a cubicle that has elements of an office, or perhaps the working space of a customs officer. There is no door in the cubicle, no way to get out.

The impossibility of the task is interrupted every now and then by a combination of 32 dance moves, that immediately give the robot a scarily human character. The robotic arm doesn’t just work – can’t help myself, as the title says – but interrupts its labor by shaking its ass, by waving at visitors, by performing a ‘twist’, ‘scratch an itch’, ‘bow and shake’, ‘jazz-hands’ or a pirouette. Many of the pre-programmed dance moves are familiar looking. They immediately change the character of the robotic arm into something almost human. It has become a true Sisyphus, taking a dance break from his endless labor.

Human interaction

Above the cubicle are visual-recognition sensors that measure if the liquid gets close to a perfect circle and also if there are visitors around. In either one of those cases, the robot starts performing, dancing, moving, and waving around, whereby it clearly interacts with the visitor.

Watching Can’t Help Myself is like looking at a caged animal, and visitors interact with it as such. The work has a darkly humorous side. But however much you dance and shake along with it, the giant pool of blood cannot be unseen.

‘Can’t Help Myself’ Robot Arm

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Advertisements A November 8 2021 Facebook post about Can’t Help Myself, a robot arm in a purported art installation, was extremely popular on that platform. It read:

I don’t think any piece of art has ever emotionally affected me the way this robot arm piece has affected me. It’s called “Can’t Help Myself” and it’s a robot arm that’s programmed to clean up the fluid that’s constantly leaking out of itself, that looked like a never ending flow of blood. It has programmed dance moves to make it appear to have human gestures. And at first, it seemed happy and proud of its job, dancing around when it had visitors. But three years later, it looks tired, hopeless, and like it’s living in a never ending cycle of constantly trying to put itself back together for the entertainment of other people. And when I found out that it had finally stopped working in 2019, essentially dying, I couldn’t help but imagine the relief it must’ve felt and so I’ve been in here crying over a robot arm. 🥺 It was programmed this way, it truly couldn’t help itself. And no one ever helped him, they just watched.

Two images were attached to the post, supposedly illustrating Can’t Help Myself and the robot arm in question as the events described wore on:

The existence of the Can’t Help Myself robot was not difficult to validate. On Guggenheim.org, an entry about the installation indicated that the Guggenheim Museum commissioned the work in 2016 and described the piece:

In this work commissioned for the Guggenheim Museum, Sun Yuan & Peng Yu employ an industrial robot, visual-recognition sensors, and software systems to examine our increasingly automated global reality, one in which territories are controlled mechanically and the relationship between people and machines is rapidly changing. Placed behind clear acrylic walls, their robot has one specific duty, to contain a viscous, deep-red liquid within a predetermined area. When the sensors detect that the fluid has strayed too far, the arm frenetically shovels it back into place, leaving smudges on the ground and splashes on the surrounding walls.

Sun Yuan & Peng Yu are known for using dark humor to address contentious topics, and the robot’s endless, repetitive dance presents an absurd, Sisyphean view of contemporary issues surrounding migration and sovereignty. However, the bloodstain-like marks that accumulate around it evoke the violence that results from surveilling and guarding border zones. Such visceral associations call attention to the consequences of authoritarianism guided by certain political agendas that seek to draw more borders between places and cultures and to the increasing use of technology to monitor our environment.

On December 29 2016, the Guggenheim Museum’s official YouTube account shared a time-lapse video of Can’t Help Myself going through its motions. Guggenheim.org said in its entry that artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu worked with engineers and “designed a series of thirty-two movements for machine to perform,” alluding to the unsettling feelings described in the November 2021 Facebook post:

Observed from the cage-like acrylic partitions that isolate it in the gallery space, the machine seems to acquire consciousness and metamorphose into a life-form that has been captured and confined in the space. At the same time, for viewers the potentially eerie satisfaction of watching the robot’s continuous action elicits a sense of voyeurism and excitement, as opposed to thrills or suspense. In this case, who is more vulnerable: the human who built the machine or the machine who is controlled by a human?

On December 28 2016, Vice.com profiled the artists and Can’t Help Myself in an article headlined, “[Exclusive] The Guggenheim’s First Robotic Artwork Is Out of Control.” Vice described the piece as part of a larger exhibition slated to run until March 10 2017 — suggesting that the robot in the evocative images might not have simply collapsed into a pool of fake blood and ennui:

An enormous robotic arm, brandishing a giant squeegee, is poised over a pool of dark liquid which ceaselessly oozes outwards. With quick, smooth, aggressive movements, the machine performs a calculated dance, pivoting and dragging its squeegee across the surface in a perpetual labor of wiping the liquid back to the center. Can’t Help Myself, presented in the new exhibition Tales of Our Time, is an imposing installation by artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu which holds the title as the Guggenheim’s first robotic artwork.

The exhibition Tales of Our Time is on view at the Guggenheim Museum through March 10th [2017].

A broader Guggenheim.org entry for Tales of Our Time listed the entirety of the exhibition was slated to run from November 4 2016 until March 10 2017, with no explicit mention of Can’t Help Myself or its post-Guggenheim fate:

Tales of Our Time is not a monolithic report on the state of contemporary art in China, nor does it encapsulate any artistic trends or phenomena. Instead, it highlights the unique aspects of each artist’s perspective. The artworks—all of which are new commissions—are not just about China; they examine social and political tensions experienced worldwide, exploring themes such as individual and collective memory, migration and urbanization, cultural inclusion and exclusion, and the contradiction of technological development. The tales told in this exhibition consider our seemingly more connected, globalized world as one that is still filled with fractured land, fragmented history, and upended traditions, but, at the same time, they also propose ways to imagine culture differently.

The Facebook post described a point when its author “found out that [Can’t Help Myself] had finally stopped working in 2019, essentially dying,” ascribing a sense of relief to the robot arm. But a May 2019 DesignBoom.com item reported the appearance of Can’t Help Myself at another installation, suggesting that the piece didn’t just toil for three years before giving up in despair:

in sun yuan and peng yu’s can’t help myself, an industrial robot turns and flexes restlessly, programmed to ensure that a thick, deep red liquid stays within a predetermined area. part of the the international art exhibition may you live in interesting times, curated by ralph rugoff for the 2019 venice art biennale, the robot is placed within a transparent ‘cage’, almost like a creature captured and put on display.

DesignBoom.com’s piece said that Can’t Help Myself had been shipped to Venice, Italy, for an exhibition between May 11 and November 24 2019. A linked website explained that it appeared in a presciently titled exhibition through November 2019, May You Live In Interesting Times (concluding just before the sudden emergence of a global pandemic):

The 58th International Art Exhibition, titled May You Live In Interesting Times, took place from 11th May to 24th November 2019. The title is a phrase of English invention that has long been mistakenly cited as an ancient Chinese curse that invokes periods of uncertainty, crisis and turmoil; “interesting times”, exactly as the ones we live in today.

The 58th Exhibition is curated by Ralph Rugoff, currently the director of the Hayward Gallery in London. Between 1985 and 2002 he wrote art and cultural criticism for numerous periodicals, publishing widely in art magazines as well as newspapers, and published a collection of essays, Circus Americanus (1995). During the same period he began working as an independent curator.

On May 11 2019, the art exhibition in Venice shared video footage of Can’t Help Myself on the first day of its Italian installation: