#Botjoy
About the Bots
What are the Bots?
The Bots are small (on rare occasions, big) totemic, art objects programmed to help. They are created by me, Gary Hirsch, an artist and consultant living in Portland Oregon.
I wake up everyday thinking about how art can help and the Bots have been my vehicle for doing this in (hopefully) a delightful and surprising way.
I experiment with the Bots by making thousands painted small on the back of dominos, and a few painted giant on the sides of buildings. Please steal this idea and make your own.
Where the idea came from
the birth of the bots
The idea for the Bots came from a sketch I did in 2000 as a prompt (see image on the right) in a co-creativity journal. Weirdly tons of folks came back to me after receiving this drawing telling me all of the wonderful things that their invisible robot was telling them. So...
- We decide to make the Bots real (not just invisible and imaginary) so you could carry them around in your pocket. I made a test batch of 400 while on a family trip to Mexico and we gave them to clients and friends as our corporate gift in 2010.
- Bots were wildly popular with our clients and I LOVED making them. In my “real” work I am up on my feet, moving, facilitating, acting, improvising. When I am making Bots I am quiet, still, listening, focused and improvising. It’s a ying/yang thing. Bot making has become a vital part of my day-to-day action
- I started leaving Joy Bots on the streets as gifts for random strangers to find. I donated Brave Bots to children's hospitals. I paint them as big as I can in mural and street art form. To date I have made over 34,000 Bots and I am always looking for new ideas for using them to help folks that might need one.
- I'll keep making these until it isn't fun anymore. So far, it's still fun!!!
Socialize
