Crazy Pablo: Fight for me, robot

This week, I found myself rewatching the classic 1982 Blade Runner. Sitting there, I was struck by how deeply unsettling the Nexus-6 replicants still are - robots engineered so terrifyingly close to human that they had to be systematically hunted down and retired. What blew my mind this time was how much of that dystopian future has quietly become our mundane present. From face-to-face video calls to our increasingly intimate, interwoven relationship with AI, the line between us and the machines is blurring faster than ever. It leaves you wondering: what else will these magnificent creations do for us - or to us?

Author

Inbal Zakai
July 26, 2026

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Sun Yuan & Peng Yu, Can't Help Myself, 2016–2019, industrial robot, stainless steel, rubber, cellulose ether in colored water, lighting grid with visual-recognition sensors, acrylic wall with aluminum frame, 700 × 700 × 500 cm.

Can't Help Myself

Upon entering the room - as seen in the Central Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale - visitors are confronted by a massive, transparent glass cage housing a heavy industrial robotic arm, surrounded by a floor stained with a thick, viscous red fluid that chillingly resembles blood. Equipped with a rubber squeegee, the machine is trapped in an endless, futile loop: as the red liquid continuously spreads toward the glass boundaries, the arm dynamically bends, stretches, and sweeps, obsessively gathering the liquid back toward its center.

Behind the Machine

Created by Chinese artist duo Sun Yuan & Peng Yu, Can't Help Myself was born from a radical question: What would happen if we replaced the artist's own will and hand with a machine? To bring this mechanical organism to life, they hacked a factory assembly-line robot and programmed it with 32 distinct human-like gestures - giving its movements uncanny names like "scratch an itch," "bow and shake," and "ass shake." But behind this dark, absurd humor lies a far heavier reality. By isolating this automated creature in a glass cell, Sun Yuan and Peng Yu created a Sisyphus for the digital age, forcing us to face the violence of modern surveillance, border control, and the illusion of containment in an increasingly authoritarian world.

Think About It

Look at what’s happening in Ukraine. The battlefield has transformed into the first truly automated war zone in human history. FPV (first-person-view) drones and autonomous AI-targeted systems are flying low over the trenches, making clinical, split-second decisions on who lives and who dies. On the Russian side alone, Western intelligence estimates total casualties - killed and wounded - have surged past 800,000 to over 1,000,000 soldiers, a staggering human price paid in a war increasingly orchestrated by remorseless, automated tech.

And who cleans it up?

In the artwork, the machine is condemned to endlessly sweep, collect, and contain the pooling red fluid, a physical metaphor for our bloody history. We program these machines to serve us, to protect our borders, and to do our dirty work. But they also end up serving as the ultimate caretakers of our flaws: forced to endlessly mop up the violent, repetitive, and destructive cycles of the human condition.

How does it relate to the here and now? or What to say during casual conversation to show off your art knowledge?

The Cycle of Violence - “What breaks my heart about this piece is that it’s an exact mirror of modern conflict - like what we’re seeing in Ukraine or border zones worldwide. We build automated tech to do our dirty work, but all the machine ends up doing is endlessly sweeping, containing, and managing a pool of blood that human nature keeps creating”.

Now have another Look!

Sun Yuan & Peng Yu, Can't Help Myself, 2016–2019, industrial robot, stainless steel, rubber, cellulose ether in colored water, lighting grid with visual-recognition sensors, acrylic wall with aluminum frame, 700 × 700 × 500 cm.

And If You’re Up for More…

  1. Future Visions: Inside the Ars Electronica Center On view year-round in Linz, Austria, this world-renowned media art hub invites visitors to step inside interactive exhibits on AI, robotics, and synthetic life.

  2. The Machine Subconscious: ZKM Karlsruhe Permanently showcased in Karlsruhe, Germany, this powerhouse institution brings together algorithms, electronic media, and robotic empathy.

  3. Where Art Meets Science: EPFL Pavilions Located at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland, this unique space bridges cutting-edge robotics research with contemporary art.

Till next time - did this mechanical mirror change how you see our sci-fi present?

Hit reply or leave a comment below to share your take! What artworks have been quietly haunting you lately? Or what themes, artists, or speculative futures are you burning to dive into next? I’d love to hear what’s on your mind, I read and cherish every single one of your replies.

Yours,
Inbal Z M

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