by Allison Lee
In 2016, commissioned for the Guggenheim Museum, artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu worked with robotic engineers to set up an exhibition titled ‘Can’t Help Myself’. This display featured an industrial robot crafted from stainless steel and rubber, programmed with thirty-two movements to perform, and at first glance, seems more ordinary than anything.
Caged within acrylic partitions, a robotic arm with a squeegee affixed to its end stands prideful in a monolithic manner—at least, it did when it was first introduced to the public eye. Sun Yuan and Peng Yu’s installation has one sole purpose: to sweep up a viscous red fluid that seems to be leaking out of itself. When the sensors pick up that the liquid has flowed too far out of the predetermined area, the arm implements one of the thirty-two movements to draw the fluid back in.
During its debut period, the machine moved lively and animatedly, despite only having a limited range of motions. One could even say the arm looked as if it were dancing around while trying to gather the pool of liquid back to the middle.
Over the years, however, the robotic arm slowed down. It no longer went about its duty with aggressive swiping movements, resorting to a more sluggish pace of mopping up the red instead. A faded layer of the liquid has permanently stained the floorboards and there is now a faint screeching from the machine when it attempts to move around. The iterations of motions over time have left ruby splashes on the acrylic walls as well, the display tenfold messier than it was initially.
When people first laid eyes on the machine, they described it as “happy” and “proud of its job”; in more recent years, adjectives deployed have morphed into “tired” and “sad” instead—which brings me to the crux of this piece: How can a machine, constructed to do nothing but a repetitive task, appear to have human emotions?
Now, art is as subjective as subjectivity comes, so the following will be my interpretation of the installation; you are free to take what resonates with you and leave what does not.
Let’s begin with the most drawing feature of the exhibition: the liquid. The pool of crimson fluid undeniably attracts any passerby’s attention, emulating a steady stream of blood. If we were to go along with this personification of the robot, it almost seems like it is trying to keep what makes it ‘human’ close to itself. Blood, of course, keeps us alive. The panicked scraping of the liquid back to the predetermined area can be interpreted as the robotic arm’s futile attempts at holding itself together, only for everything to slip out of control over and over again, reminiscent of the myth of Sisyphus.
Now, onto the programming of the arm itself. I will not draw false conclusions regarding the significance of there being thirty-two movements; frankly, the number does not particularly stand out to me—it’s the naming of each of those movements I want to zoom in on. The description on Guggenheim Museum’s website details that the programmed movements were given names such as ‘scratch an itch’, ‘bow and shake’, and ‘ass shake’. These intentional naming of movements after human actions imply the artists’ wishes to personify the robot itself. The very way in which the arm sways to and fro each position, gracefully positioning itself to initiate the subsequent motion, is as if the robot is enacting human gestures.
Of course, the repetition of this sweeping motion led to the machine’s eventual delay in pace. Some speculate that the hydraulics are no longer as fresh as they were in the beginning; I will not attempt to dive into the physics of the robot itself. Now, it’s sadder to watch the machine work—at least that is the consensus across the internet. You see, two things have notably changed over the years:
First is the robot’s speed. “It looks tired” is the most common comment you will hear from people who have seen the machine at work. Indeed, it looks like it has had enough of the never-ending cycle of cleaning up an uncleanable mess while we surround its cage and watch the spectacle. Worn out from its perpetual duty, the metal screeches from its unoiled gears only amplify the heartbreak of watching it labor, sounding almost like pleads for release.
Then there are the floor stains and wall splashes, which will remain until the day the installation is dismantled. The robot is incapable of removing these remnants because of how deeply ingrained or how far out of reach they are. What I’m taking away from this is that the robot is doing exactly what it was programmed to do, yet somehow still manages to make a glorious mess of things. Every swipe of the liquid worsens the situation, but the arm can never stop moving. It can’t help itself.
We route back to the question: Why is it that this simple piece of installation, something that can probably be spotted at production belts all around the globe, evokes such a heartfelt message in those who dare linger in front of its work for too long?
Say what you want about the human race—our fatal flaws and negligence, our greed and arrogance—but the one thing that continues to inspire me is our personification of inanimate objects. Our ability to project human conditions and emotions onto things that are inherently ‘un-human’ speaks volumes about how much we care, which is especially important in this day and age. There’s no negating how desensitized we have come to be by the news and media, hence why the ability to care is precious.
The installation doesn’t actually care that it has been repeating the same thirty-two movements for the past few years. It doesn’t sense that it has made a larger mess compared to when it first started. Yet, we were a lark when the machine was newly functioning and somehow manage to feel bad for the machine when it has grown old and rusty—we emote accordingly for something that doesn’t even have the capacity for feelings.
Isn’t it oddly fascinating? In a world where we are pitted against each other, primed to shoot for the stars and nothing less, trained to be more selfish than selfless, it’s amazing that a majority of people can come together and slingshot the same human perspective onto a machine. This personification of a robot—or anything, for that matter—is marvelous to me.
It doesn’t matter what story we attribute to the robotic arm. I could interpret the piece as mimicry of how we go through our lives doing what we are told, not being able to catch a breath even if we get tired because this is the harsh, cyclical reality of life—to be worked to the bone while other people watch us struggle through glass windows; and you can take away an entirely different meaning. Either way, it’s likely that we will both agree the robot has deteriorated from a state of enthusiasm to lethargy.
We just can’t help ourselves to think otherwise.