Piksel KidZ Lab: Ewasteroid by Paul Granjon (UK)

November, Friday 18th and Saturday 19^th, 10:00 to 13:00 h
Duration: 3 hours.
Age: 10-100 years old.
Place: KUNSTSKOLEN I BERGEN,
Marken 37 i Bergen sentrum, Bergen City

Gratis verksted for barn/unge i alderen 10-100 år for påmelding: piksel22(at)piksel(dot)no
Piksel KidZ Lab is supported by Bergen Kommune and Vestland Fylkeskommune.

Ewasteroid

The beauty and the ugliness of electronic waste fight it off in this workshop for curious people. Starting with a pile of electronic waste items such as printers, pc towers, DVD players the participants will build a spinning asteroid made of out of date components and found timber, mining the old machines for intricate and complex parts. The resulting temporary sculpture is both celebration of human engineering and sinister indicator of an extractivist civilisation gone in overdrive.

Expect improvisation, technological creativity, freestyle wiring, collaboration and low-tech solutions. In line with Granjon’s current methods, the machine will work off-grid, be made of 90% recycled or found components and use open source technology controllers (Arduino).

The Ewasteroid belongs to Granjon’s extensive practice of Wrekshops, participat. The events combine hands-on, fun making with grassroots conversations inspired by the material, its abundance and creative potential.

The participants do not need to have prior knowledge of electronics or programming, start age 7 (under 12 accompanied by an adult). The workshop can run for a few hours or a whole day or 2, with participants coming and going, or booking a slot. Max 7 participants at a time with 1 assistant.

The Ewasteroid will be exhibited as an installation after the workshop, before its parts return to the recycling plant.

The first Ewasteroid was tested during the Deershed Festival in the UK in July 2022, more info at https://www.zprod.org/zwp/ewasteroid/

Paul Granjon (UK)

Paul Granjon is interested in the co-evolution of humans and machines, imagining solutions for alternative futures and sharing his experience of creative technologies. He has been making robots and other machines for exhibitions and performances since 1996. Granjon’s work became known for a trademark combination of humour and serious questions, delivered with absurd machines that made use of recycled components. His Sexed Robots were exhibited in the Welsh Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2005. He performs and exhibits internationally, with recent commissions in Garage Museum Moscow and Azkuna Zentroa Bilbao. He regularly delivers Wrekshops, public events where participants are invited to take apart electronic waste and build temporary new machines from the bits they find. Granjon’s current work is driven by an ecologist and participatory agenda. He teaches Fine-Art in Cardiff School of Art and Design, UK and completed a practice-based PhD in robotic arts in 2022.