On Saturday night, as a part of Montreal's Nuit Blanche celebration, I had the pleasure of being treated to ROBO_COOP at l'Usine C. ROBO_COOP consisted of an orchestra of robotic puppets controlled by a litany of laptops generating both movement and music. The exhibit was mildly disturbing in that post-apocalyptic sense that one might expect, but there was also something fragile, touching, and almost organic about it.

Bill Vorn from HEXAGRAM was one of the robotic artists present. His dancing hydraulic tower could be found at the center of the exhibit. It was fascinating to watch its movements mimic those of its operator: motion sensors wired to its operator's body caused it to follow her movements in real time. Earlier this year I had the pleasure of visiting Bill Vorn's robotics lab at Concordia and I'm glad I finally got the chance to see one of his pieces in action.