Balance-Unbalance 2015

This exhibit is open 6:00-9:00 pm March 22-29.

Robotanic Mobile Gardens--Soybots III
Shannon McMullen & Fabian Winkler

Climate, energy, agriculture, politics: the project Robotanic Mobile Gardens – SoyBots III belongs to a series of art installations and discursive interventions, collectively focused on critical gardening strategies which demonstrate just how deeply entangled these conditions are. In the global context, soybean production is at the heart of both climate change problems and suggested solutions to food security issues. Thus, soybean plants are mobilized for their significance to global food production, their strong association with a hybridity between nature and technology —in this case as a result of biotechnological strategies for increasing crop yields through genetic modification—and vulnerability to changing climate and water conditions as a result of global warming. 

Gardens express ideas and social relations; some are sites where art and technology produce material realities, social narratives and visualize politics. In this case, mobile gardens unite code, robotics and soybean plants (robotanics) to create a speculative interactive installation that suggests questions about climate, place and agriculture implicated in contemporary practices and values. As self-pollinating organisms in combination with a light-seeking mobile robotic platform, temperature and moisture sensors, soybean plants metaphorically address the evolving interdependence between humans and cultivated crops and the underlying political nature of photosynthesis. 

These relationships are expressed through three autonomous robotic platforms, outfitted with custom planter boxes containing soybean plants, that roam interior space in search of optimal light conditions and ideal temperatures while monitoring soil moisture to promote plant growth in local conditions. To identify optimal light conditions, the robot host employs a phototropic control strategy, using sensors to track and follow sunlight intensity or to locate LED grow lights. Moisture sensors connected to an Arduino microcontroller trigger a flashing yellow light when moisture levels are too low, prompting humans to attend to the plants. Finally, temperature sensors are similarly used to allow the soybeans to indicate their need for increased or decreased warmth. ‘Shivering’ indicates a need for higher temperatures. In contrast, the robot will seek dimmer locations when it is too warm. With SoyBots III, soybeans become an ‘evocative object’ (Turkle, 2011) – something that can provoke reflection, speculation and attract emotion.