a history of cybernetic animals and early robots
1982 – "A2W2" the Andy Warhol Robot. "I want to be a machine, and I feel that whatever I do and do machine-like is what I want to do. I think everybody should be a machine." Andy Warhol, Nov 1963. Source: Times Daily, Oct 30, 1982. Alvaro Villa with some of his animatronic figures. Image …
Read More “1982 – “A2W2” the Andy Warhol Robot – Lewis Allen / Alvaro Villa (American/Columbian)”
Inventor Shunichi Mizuno, now president of Cybot Corporation in Japan, at work on his robot. Image source: Robots, machines in man's image, Isaac Asimov, Karen A. Frenkel – 1985. Photo by Mark Wexler. Caption: Instead of diamonds, up to 20,000 electronic components are this girl's best friends. Low-[pressure] pneumatic valves controlled by a microcomputer give …
Read More “1982 – “Marilyn Monroe” the Cybot – Shunichi Mizuno (Japanese)”
SEEING THE ELEPHANT. Not Barnum's, But the Great Mechanical Wonder. Few theatre-goers have any intelligent conception of the mechanism of some of the "animals" that are in the cast of a modern spectacular drama or comic opera. A long time ago when the heifer was part and parcel of "Evangeline," it caused an infinite amount …
Read More “1891 – Mechanical Elephant – Woolson Morse (American)”
Messmore & Damon Mechanical Elephant. (Sourced from the Messmore & Damon catalogue.) This mechanical elephant does everything but walk! Although Messmore & Damon had been around for some time, the interest here is around the animated elephants. There were early mammoths made for The World a Million Years Ago for the Chicago Fair, but the …
Read More “1939 – Mechanical Elephants by Messmore & Damon (American)”
Copy of original artwork. Labyrinth scene with Humongous: Excerpt from Inside the Labyrinth: Check Youtube for clips on "The Making of the Labyrinth". The text for Inside the Labyrinth documentary was originally transcribed by Stephanie Massick. JIM HENSON: "It seemed like right late in the story what we wanted was for our heroes to come …
Read More “1986 – “Humongous” (Labyrinth) – Jim Henson (American) / George Gibbs (British)”