Robotic arms have long been a common sight in many industries. They are currently making a rapid entry into art and design studios and practices. Yet, at the same time, difficulties remain in accessing the workflows and work methods demanded by these machines given a clear lack of reference resources. The research project “A Third Hand” uses applied case studies to explore and define a set of exemplary work methods, capable of both informing and inspiring future users.

Through an open call we invited 5 artists from different fields. Each of them realized a project involving a robotic arm together with the research team. Besides these projects we held also a workshop at ECAL introducing Design Students to working with robotic arms. The findings and tools coming from these workshops flow into our robotic arm “cookbook” which is currently in development and will be available on the website third-hand.xyz.

The Research Project is conducted at ECAL, Switzerland. Together with AATB (Andrea Anner & Thibault Brevet) and Alain Bellet.

40 Students & 4 Robots drawing letters

Artist collaborations