Neutral Puppet Training

Puppetry is one of our oldest art forms. But at Rusty Squid we use it as one of our core tools. It is an ideal way to study embodiment, emotion and emergence. Training our robotic engineers, designers and artists in the fundamentals of puppetry we now know is essential to create great work. Why is puppetry not widely used in the development of contemporary robotics today? It’s just crazy that most of the robotic studios in our world are so isolated from the moving arts: dance, puppetry, movement analysis. Few of our engineers ever go to see live dance or puppetry let alone ever dance themselves. These art forms are 1000’s of years old and hold insights, principles and experience that far outreaches the knowledge that can be collecting from streams of data and observation alone. One must move, literally engage their muscles and tendons, stimulate balance and sweat in one’s own body to truly become literate in the nature of social and emotional competence. It will be the research labs and robotic companies this century that flourish who get on their feet and get physical. As robotics enters our intimate lives we can expect profound social and cultural transformation. However, many in the creative industries are dismissive of the work that our engineers and scientists are doing, and are disengaged with emerging technologies. These artists are unwittingly neglecting their social responsibility to guard and guide our cultural evolution.