Each year, Gogbot has a different theme that the presenting artists and their installations have to follow. This year´s topic is ´Spaceship Earth´, which relates to the future of human race on Earth and possibly in the outer space. This theme inspired artists to create a lot of interesting projects that you can see in the center of Enschede until this Sunday, the 14th of September.
Opening of the festival
The grand opening of this year´s Gogbot took place at Oude Markt, where UT´s Rector Magnificus Ed Brinksma started the festival by opening an imaginary curtain. In his speech, Brinskma pointed out the cooperation between the festival and the university and he expressed a wish for even closer collaboration in the future.
To launch the festival in style, Angelo Vermeulen presented the Seeker project that revolves around a prototype ´spaceship´ that is currently standing at Oude Markt. This spaceship was created by local artists and it was build from several old caravans and other recycled materials. As a part of Seeker project, a team of five people will live inside this spaceship during the entire festival.
Student projects
There are five projects created by UT students displayed at the festival. All of them were made by the first year students of the bachelor´s program of creative technology, but each student team took a different approach to the overall festival theme.
Project ´Evolution Mirror´ tries to show how people might change if they´re living in the outer space. The installation consists of a digital ´mirror´ that makes your face look like an alien. Its goal is to point out that even people might one day evolve into a form of an alien race if they inhabit other planets.
‘Community Spaceship’ project allows the visitors to co-create a spaceship by drawing its design and adding elements they think a spaceship should include. These elements can be recycling, energy, sustainability or even happiness. The visitors´ additions are then displayed on a big screen, so anybody can see and contribute to the end result.
´Space Simulation´ is an interactive gaming experience, which demands two users to cooperate in order to win. There is a ‘technician’ operating a control unit and ´a pilot´ that navigates the ship appearing on the screen.
The installation titled ´Experience Mars´ also has a form of a game and it allows visitors to experience the delay that occurs while maneuvering the Mars rover. The user needs to drive the miniature rover to different spots on the game surface while having a 3 seconds delay between pressing the controller and the movement of the vehicle.
The last featured student project ´Illuminatable´ is a special music table that allows people to use their phones or hands to create music. The idea behind this project was to make a practical tool that keeps astronauts entertained and that also encourages teamwork.
How to find them
We are sure that if you decide to visit Gogbot, you will also want to see the installations made by UT students. As it turns out, their installations are not all that easy to find. They are situated at so called ´Fase 2´ location, which is inside a building in a small street called Achter t´Hofje. You can find this location by following Raadhuistraat and turning left near the Douwe Egberts shop.
