Discussions around A.I., robots and the future of technology are everywhere these days, including in arts and performance spaces, with countless articles about possibility and positive effects on productivity and invitations to embrace the new and bask in modernity’s next chapter. But there are also plenty of warnings and there is deep skepticism. Are we entering an apocalyptic nightmare full of crazed machines and nefarious applications? How wary should we be?

In this world of extremes, many investigators and scholars are seeking a more nuanced line of inquiry. One that charts a course of curiosity and awe. One that considers both function and affect. One that sees A.I. and robotics as collaborative fields rather than just tools to be utilized. These broader dialogs are leading trailblazers, like Catie Cuan, into emerging fields such as choreorobotics.

Longtime Bay Area resident Cuan adds a unique and much-needed perspective to this vast conversation. A dancer, choreographer, engineer, roboticist, and most importantly, a self-proclaimed lifelong dreamer, Cuan completed her undergraduate studies at UC Berkeley in the Haas School of Business and the Department of Theater, Dance and Performance Studies. Next she headed to Stanford, earning a Master of Science and in June 2023, a PhD in mechanical engineering. A resume of a Renaissance human. These extensive and varied studies coupled with significant events in her personal life led Cuan on a journey: to further understand how art and technology can interact, to investigate the affective role of machines and to throw her hat into the choreorobotic ring

“Choreorobotics is a portmanteau of the terms choreography and robotics,” Cuan explains. “This burgeoning field looks at the intersection of dance, robotics and A.I., and mines our understanding of how bodies and embodied entities move through three dimensional spaces.” As luck would have it, there is a local playground sitting at Pier 15 in San Francisco that is primed for this kind of investigation: the Exploratorium.

In the summer of 2023, Cuan joined the Exploratorium team as an artist-in-residence, a platform track committed to innovation and out-of-the-box thinking that the museum has fostered for a half century. Having been an avid visitor to the Exploratorium since childhood, Cuan knew what a special environment she was entering into, “with experimentation at its core, the Exploratorium is such a unique place to build work – you are encouraged to try something, take it out on the floor and have people engage with it, even if it isn’t fully finished.” In fact, this particular residency doesn’t come with a specific end-game expectation; instead acting as more of an incubator, concerned with what artists and makers uncover during their process.

Catie Cuan, photo by Hans Peter Brondmo. Main Image: Catie Cuan photo by Christopher Michel

With her gaze on choreorobotics and the support of such an incomparable institution, Cuan dove in headfirst to the multi-year post with a mammoth goal: constructing an artistic robot for the public to experience at the museum. “This is my first time building a robot from scratch and quickly I learned that it involved parallelizing many different efforts at the same time: from the actual physical structure, to writing software for the robot, to crafting A.I. for it to be able to learn from the behaviors and environment it exists in,” says Cuan. Equally important were the esthetics of the robot, especially considering the Exploratorium’s visitor demographics.

Chief Experience Officer Anne Richardson recently commented that around 20 percent of visitors are school groups, with families comprising about half the remaining audience. So, designing a robot with children in mind was top of Cuan’s priority list, “I want the robot to be soft and approachable, with a lovable affect that a child can sense and feel, and concurrently,

I want the robot to learn nurture and caretaking, which is where A.I. becomes part of the equation.” Cuan and team — engineer Edwin Lai, designer Jade Muir and software engineers Ethan Qiu and Michelle Pan ­­— are hard at work on their robotics project, set to be part of the Exploratorium’s machine learning exhibition which will run from June through September, 2025. Prior to that summer showcase, Exploratorium patrons will have the opportunity to engage with Cuan — and with choreorobotics this December. On Thursday, December 12, and Saturday, December 14, Cuan will be performing an abridged version of a previous work, “Breathless,” co-created with Cal professor Ken Goldberg. “‘Breathless" was originally an eight-hour duet between me and a robot, celebrating human labor and exalting the body at work,” notes Cuan. “The plan is to excerpt the piece with the Thursday night running around 90 minutes, followed by a 20-minute family oriented afternoon show on the Saturday.”

Cuan, whose work with robots has been featured in The New York Times, PBS NewsHour, and in a TED Talk titled "Teaching Robots How to Dance," is keenly aware that the pace of choreorobotics and A.I. is incredibly fast-moving, and keeping up with all the latest developments, shifts and changes takes a village. “We need to assess if we are asking the right questions in the present moment and we must realize that this line of inquiry is going to be longstanding,” she says. “We are creating a new mode of installation, utilizing technology to express a richer, deeper idea about robotics and human interaction.”

→ Visit the Exploratorium at Pier 15, San Francisco; online at exploratorium.edu