Automata Tour in Falmouth and Hastings
In June, my family and I took a holiday in the UK and during that time I had the chance to connect with some friends and colleagues from the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre. We spent one week in Falmouth, Cornwall, the original home of the CMT storefront and currently the headquarters of many world renowned automata makers.
The first stop on the automata tour was Stithians, where I was fortunate to get the chance to reconnect with amazing automata maker Paul Spooner. I had seen his workshop in the film ‘Made in Stithians’ and in the book ‘The Art of Tinkering’ but it was very special to make a visit in person.
I really liked seeing in-progress automata and pieces that are under repair. It’s possible to notice so many small details that go into the designs. I took note of the spring arm connections, homemade bellows and the technique of laying figures loosely on a moving surface.
Seeing the tools and materials that Paul uses to make his automata was a wonderful experience that I’ll be thinking about for a long time.
The next day, we went for a field trip to see Engineered Arts, a robotics company founded by Will Jackson, the son of original CMT founder Sue Jackson and the brother of current director Sarah Alexander. Will and crew are working on some really amazing conversational robots that are used in science centers and other cultural institutions around the world. It was amazing to see the variety of tools and materials that the team works with to create the robots. The mix of large scale machining work, digital technology, hand-painting small details and sewing felt like the natural high ceiling of our programmable automata explorations.
One thing that drew my attention was a little cardboard maquette of moving eyes made out of a plastic bottle and cardboard. This little experiment was used to play with the idea of the way the robotic eyes follow people around the room. It was fun to see that even in a high-tech environment where many prototyping tools exist, there’s still a place for cardboard construction.
The robots from Engineered Arts are starting to use AI in their language models for Ameca robots and it was really interesting to see some of the themes that people have been recently discussing around ChatGPT and other software take shape in humanoid form. It was really compelling to have a conversation with the AI powered robot and curious to see that even the programmers we’re quite sure what would happen next. I’m interested to see the development of these technologies.
A couple days later we met back up with Paul and his wife Sue for a little tour of some automata on display in the city. We went to the Falmouth Art Gallery and although their vast collection of automata weren’t available for the public, we did see a beautiful piece by Fi Henshall as part of a temporary exhibition on the legends surrounding King Arthur.
Downstairs from the art gallery, we entered the children’s section of the Falmouth Library where we encountered an amazing giant automata made by Keith Newstead. This masterpiece is a adaptation of a series of novels called the Gormengast Trilogy (now on my to read list) and depicts many scenes from the book. Incredible work from one of my favorite automata artists.
After the week in Falmouth, we made our way to Hastings where we met up with Sarah, Max, Lou, John and Gary from the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre. It’s a very exciting time to be visiting, because preparations are underway to open a new “mechanical maker space” which will serve as a permanent home for the organization.
Sarah took us on a tour of the new automata themed environment which will be part of Hastings Commons, a local community project to fill old buildings with interesting art and cultural projects. The neighborhood is beautiful and quirky and home to lots of interesting coffee shops, bookstores, galleries and the local library building.
There’s a lot of potential for this space to be used for tinkering workshops, artist talks, book signings, window displays, special events and many more. I’m really looking forward to collaborating with CMT on this space and helping to create new programs and prototypes once it’s up and running.
Cabaret Mechanical Theatre is currently running a crowd funding campaign to get started in the space and there are tons of fun rewards. Take a look and consider supporting this worthwhile project so that we can inspire more kids and adults by engaging with the art, science, engineering and storytelling of automata in a new and innovative space.