Adelbrecht was a speaking, interactive
robot
A robot is a machine—especially one Computer program, programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions Automation, automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the robot control, co ...
in the form of a
ball
A ball is a round object (usually spherical, but sometimes ovoid) with several uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for s ...
, designed by Martin Spanjaard (born 1952 in
Haarlem
Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English language, English) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the Provinces of the Nether ...
,
Netherlands
, Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
).
A first, simple version of Adelbrecht was presented in 1985.
Starting 1988, a second, more powerful version was developed. The successor was able to detect several different 'situations': rolling, bumping, being stuck, being petted etc. Moreover, Adelbrecht was now capable of displaying different states of nature: sleep or awake. Combined with variables nicknamed 'lust' and 'fatigue', the situations and states of nature enabled Adelbrecht to interact with, and respond to its immediate and past environment. In 1992 Adelbrecht received an honourable mentioning at the
Prix Ars Electronica. Its last performance, planned at New Year's Eve 2000, never took place because of serious hardware failure. From then on, Spanjaard proclaimed Adelbrecht a 'dead robot'.
Etymology
The name "Adelbrecht" consists of two
Middle Dutch
Middle Dutch is a collective name for a number of closely related West Germanic dialects whose ancestor was Old Dutch. It was spoken and written between 1150 and 1500. Until the advent of Modern Dutch after 1500 or , there was no overarching sta ...
words, Adel (Good) and Brecht (Nice). Modern versions of this name are
Albert or
Elbert.
See also
Robotic art
Robotic art is any artwork that employs some form of robotic or automated technology. There are many branches of robotic art, one of which is robotic installation art, a type of installation art that is programmed to respond to viewer interactions ...
References
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{{refend
External links
Article by Francisco van Jole in the Dutch magazine Blvd (1994)*
Article about Atos Origin on the Dutch Wikipedia
Ars Electronica Linz, Honorable mentioning (1992)Page about Adelbrecht in the Catalogue of the NIMK (Netherlands Media Art Institute)Short bio of Martin Spanjaard at V2, Institute of the unstable media, the NetherlandsVideo registration at YouTube (3'40")
Individual robots
1985 robots
Robots of the Netherlands
Spherical orb robots