Soft manipulator

A playful interactive installation where the audience experiments with rhythms, mechanics, and objects. Everyday items like glasses, pots, as well as small musical instruments are placed on a light platform. Seven robotic mechanic devices can be manipulated interactively by the audience, manipulating the sound of the objects. The six robotic mechanics beat the objects, creating a constantly changing polyrhythmic web of sound and rhythm.

“Simon Moritz Geist’s new work ‘Soft Manipulator’, continues to explore the black box of electronic sound production by laying out an array of everyday objects and mini-robots, which acoustically interact with these objects, on the flat surface of a table. As in his previous well-known robot installation “MR 808 Interactive Drum Machine”, the audience can control this interaction, this time by means of easily manipulating objects and knobs which require no particular expertise to operate. Thus the installation supports an inherent desire for experimentation and sound – in a playful way with everyday objects and mechanical robots.” (Jessica Buskirk, ALTANA Gallery)