![[OLD SEMESTER] 15-104 • Introduction to Computing for Creative Practice](wp-content/uploads/2023/09/stop-banner.png)
Gilberto Esparza is an artist based in Mexico, and his work explored the relationship between the built environment and the natural environment. Esparza mainly used electronics and robotics as his medium to express, making his work futuristic and engaging. Furthermore, I think his work achieved great depth in discussing our impact on the natural world. I especially admired Esparza’s Urban Parasites project and his Nomadic Plants project. What I found interesting across Esparza’s projects was the interaction between his robots and their surrounding environment. In the Urban Parasites project, Esparza made robot insects from industrial wastes, and he designed the robots to be autonomous. The robot insects convert the city’s light energy into the electricity that they require to function. In the Nomadic Plants project, Esparza’s robots acquired energy from contaminated waters in the city. What was most interesting about Esparza’s work is how he focused on how the robots would blend into the urban environment and people’s interaction with those robots. His projects inspired people living in urban communities to reflect on the consequences of urbanization and pollution. Finally, Esparza’s project lecture presented videos and photographs and introduced his process with sketches, which was engaging.
