overheadbots

overheadbots live on overheads, a bit like parasites they sit on top of the overhead and convert its light into their proper motion. the overheadbots are completely autonomous, all their energy is delivered by the overhead. the whole system is like a little ecosystem and works once the overhead is turned on without any further intervention.
the projected screen is like a 2 dimensional window to this world on the overhead projector, a world with real collisions, and unforeseeable events. on the other side the screen can also be seen as a an animated display, where color patches move around and form an ever-changing image.

the overheadbots are actually simple suneaters based on mark tilden’s 1 beam technology. the difference is that their solar-panel faces downwards to the light of the overhead instead of upwards to the sun and that they carry little umbrellas that project an image onto the screen.

overheadbots where shown at the art of the overhead festival in kopenhagen october 2005, at the piksel festival for free/libre and opensource audiovisual software, hardware and art in bergen norway in 2006, together with ralf schreiber and his overhead robots at the artbots show in gent in 2006, and in 2007 with the art of the overhead in the exhibition ‘borderline behaviour – drawn towards animation’ at tent center for visual arts rotterdam, as part of the international film festival rotterdam, with ralf schreiber at lab30 a media arts festival in augsburg 2007, in the exhibition ‘fastforward on new media art: robots’ at the palazzo di arte in naples in 2007, at the  industrion in kerkrade in 2008/2009.