The City of Montpellier is presenting an original exhibition at La Panacée until February 28. The premise for Anatomy of Automatons is the analogy between the human body and machines in order to explore the imaginary possibilities of artificial life. A visit among robots, ancient medical works from the University of Montpellier archives, and works of art.
Ever since Antiquity, the automaton, whether magical, idiotic, super-powerful, or rebellious, has nourished an uncountable number of stories. Situated somewhere between fascination and terror, this ambivalent character highlights the machine-like side of man while revealing the paradoxical humanity of technical objects.
La Panacée, the City of Montpellier’s center for contemporary culture, dedicated to visual arts and new technologies, is focusing on the subject by overlapping different perspectives: some forty contemporary works of art are juxtaposed with documents and objects from University of Montpellier collections -- both the University of Medicine and the LIRMM laboratory (Montpellier Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics, and Microelectronics). This includes fragmented bodies, cyborg prostheses, anthropomorphic machines, and more.
Beyond their disturbing strangeness, all of these objects offer an unusual look at the relationship that man has established with technology.
For this exhibition, the mediation department presents creative, experimental features related to the topic, open to the public continuously: Panapop workshops for children, other workshops, tours and points of view... with artists and invited guests. Other features are also presented continually in the exhibition rooms: robots, a miniature 3D Fab Lab... and a surprising articulated arm that holds a ball-point pen in its gripper: visitors can pose in front of a small camera connected to the arm, and watch as the articulated arm draws their portrait with the pen...
Presented in a building that was once one of the most prestigious schools of medicine, the exhibition was designed by Mamco (Geneva Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art), as a co-production with La Panacée, in partnership with the University of Montpellier’s Scientific Culture and Historical Monuments Department, and the Montpellier Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics, and Microelectronics (LIRMM), the University of Medicine’s Conservatory of Anatomy, the inter-university library, Poly’Tech Montpellier, and the Gilbert Simondon archives.
Find out more:
- La Panacée
La Panacée, the City of Montpellier’s center for contemporary culture, dedicated to visual arts and new technologies, is focusing on the subject by overlapping different perspectives: some forty contemporary works of art are juxtaposed with documents and objects from University of Montpellier collections -- both the University of Medicine and the LIRMM laboratory (Montpellier Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics, and Microelectronics). This includes fragmented bodies, cyborg prostheses, anthropomorphic machines, and more.
Beyond their disturbing strangeness, all of these objects offer an unusual look at the relationship that man has established with technology.
For this exhibition, the mediation department presents creative, experimental features related to the topic, open to the public continuously: Panapop workshops for children, other workshops, tours and points of view... with artists and invited guests. Other features are also presented continually in the exhibition rooms: robots, a miniature 3D Fab Lab... and a surprising articulated arm that holds a ball-point pen in its gripper: visitors can pose in front of a small camera connected to the arm, and watch as the articulated arm draws their portrait with the pen...
Presented in a building that was once one of the most prestigious schools of medicine, the exhibition was designed by Mamco (Geneva Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art), as a co-production with La Panacée, in partnership with the University of Montpellier’s Scientific Culture and Historical Monuments Department, and the Montpellier Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics, and Microelectronics (LIRMM), the University of Medicine’s Conservatory of Anatomy, the inter-university library, Poly’Tech Montpellier, and the Gilbert Simondon archives.
Find out more:
- La Panacée
