It's interesting when you keep in mind, this is not artificial inteligence. It's just a bunch of sensors and programmed movements. It's a very simple robot- not much more than automatic sliding doors that open when you come near it. But the context that the artists created around that simplicity makes us personify the machine in a profound way.

It’s funny how people does not understand that this is an ARTWORK which should make you feel something. If you don’t feel anything about it then you are just not appreciating it. You are not supposed to understand art itself, you should feel something and make your own meaning. That’s how it is.

This art makes feel like it’s done something it regret and can’t go back, it still tries to fix it and never gives up

I feel like this piece represents trying to hold yourself together even though you know that it's pointless. No matter how hard you try or how much you panic you can't contain it all be it regrets, worry, or otherwise. Trying to clean the mess only makes it worse, but you truly can't help yourself.

For me it's like surviving and I think this machine is meant to be broken. Cause rn this machine is already rusty and slow. Just like us, we keep on fighting and fixing ourselves but surely, the day will come that we'll be tired and just eventually stop. This is just my opinion ok? That's how I see this artwork. Also, some people think it's about fixing and preventing your mistakes to spill but no matter what happens, the damage is done and you'll make it even worse the more you try to hide it.

I think the emotional reaction ppl have towards the robot is the true “art” in all of this. If we are feeling empathy for a simple robot. It proves AI would/could get too powerful for us as we are capable of empathy to objects that don’t even have a soul. While robots are not capable of empathy at all.

This is the one and only piece of art I’ve actually felt.

I think that’s why it makes me so upset. Seeing it sentenced to do a task that seems so stressful and is never ending. Not only that but the robot can’t leave. It’s stuck doing this chore…. Feels like how people are a slave to capitalism. Being born into wealth is like winning the lottery but when you’re stuck in poverty it’s a never ending loop of survival. “If I work hard enough I can get out of debt” but the moment we clean up one mess the next thing in life has spilled out the other side. The never ending puddle. This is a visual representation of how anxiety feels.

The robot is a really good representation of how some people cope with there problems and wounds, it just keeps cleaning the liquid thing from the robot itself and the robot tries to stop it from overflowing like some of us. We try to keep it inside to the point it became a normal thing which is not healthy. It's a never ending cycle of how we try to hide our feelings and problems.

These two are really cutting edge. Check out their site. Its supposed to make you think and in some cases be offensive. Thats the point. So instead of being small minded think about why they are doing it. Maybe it is so your supposed to be outraged(dog video) so you will act .By making it they sure are doing something about it, not just making comments on the internet.

It started off doing such a great job, with so much confidence

I think what makes this piece even more beautiful is everyone's solidarity in discomfort. It's like everyone wants to care and do something, voices their desire to care and act, and it just makes the world a bit more wholesome with a darker tone, somehow.

You know an artwork is amazing when it makes you feel something

I just saw this in facebook ctto It's a robot arm that's programmed to clean up the fluid that's constantly leaking out of itself, that looked like a never ending flow of blood. It has programmed dance moves to make it appear to have human gestures, at first it seemed happy and proud of it's job, but 3 years later it looks tired, hopeless and like it's living in a never ending cycle of constantly trying to put itself back together for the entertainment of other people.

it used to dance and clean. now its rusty. its tired.

Dude it's sad the robot is given a task that will never end it probably has so much anxiety and stress and just wants it to be done I know it's a robot but still it's sad 😭

This art has a meaning to never give up and more meanings too. The main objective for the robot/machine is to clean up their own oil And for 3 years its still trying, robots/machines don't have feelings but we do that's the reason why we feel sad watching this robot/machine clean It's because it represents us humans and lots of different meanings, the robot/machine is an arm just like a humans arm trying to get rid of their own blood and still trying to get rid of the blood loss Just like us humans making mistakes and trying, never give up kids this is some good meaning and good art RIP Cant help myself 2016-2019 Now it doesn't have to suffer no more

I must say this that robot made me cry it remind me of my grandma on future when she dies 😭😢☹ my grandma makes us happy help us never gives up but we dont treat her well but now she feels like shes dying but she won't give up...

To me, the robots erratic movements are beautiful, they are the machines expression outside of its programming. They may be painful to feel and watch but they are genuine. They are true. They are unique. They are human

this art makes me feel kinda nostalgic and it gives me chills at the same time.

I interpret this as the existentialism of living, knowing that no matter what you do, you can't help everyone, there will always be suffering, and eventually we all will die. But we keep trying anyhow.

Art. This is one of the most peaceful and calm yet chaotic and misplacing thing I have ever seen. In my eyes this machine represents the struggle to hold it together. Like in life, we get lost behind the flow of it all and it ends up messy and unorganized like this machine. And the machines snap shows stress and breakdown in the human mind.

Not me crying over a robot. I wanna walk in and clean up the mess so it can take a rest already. That helpless feeling of falling apart while everyone is watching and not helping is very triggering to me.

My interpretation: It's trying to clean up it's all it's messes at the same time, panicking that everyone is watching it struggle and work. Its pretty rusted now and I think that adds to the story. It was super panicky and fast moving but now it's slow and less jittery movements showing that it's tired but it just can't help itself.

Relatability is what makes humans emotional, when we watch something that dies or get tired, we remember how what we are watching is relatable to us, how daily work is making us tired or how we are going to die at the end

I am currently writing an essay on importance of explanation in art, using this art piece as an example. Essentially, the main idea is that in order for the artist to display a meaning or convey some sort of thought or emotion within the audience, it's important for them to know how to structure their artwork in a way that is effective in communicating with their audience. Looking at it from a rather objective perspective, it is simply a robot programmed to perform a job, it does not feel any sort of exhaustion or agony from performing these motions. However, as the liquid has a deep red colour which is similar to blood, the audience makes a connection between this and blood; making the machine rather, humane so to say. In addition to this, the endless cycle of completing a chore only to do it again as it becomes messy again is easy for people to relate to, think cleaning up dishes or taking out the trash: it always has to be done. For this piece, I find it rather interesting how the artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu has decided to include the little 'dance' and 'waving' motions the robot performs in between the scooping of the liquid. I thought of the alternative, of leaving it to simply do the scooping motions in a cycle, and I believe the alternative would be rather boring. The audience would have lost interest after a while should the exhibition only consist of a robot scooping up ink. Yes, the visual of scooping up blood, and the idea of a continuous never-ending task, would still stand. However, including the little 'waves' and 'dancing' makes the robot even more human-like. Not only that, but it makes us feel sorry for the robot, as it has to stop dancing to continue its task. The artistic choices made in this art piece is truly admirable, they are effective in creating a vision and expressing a scene of humane emotions using simply a robotic arm and some red ink. It is unfortunate that the installation had to be taken down, I would have loved to experience it in person :)

I've always seen myself in it. That's why it's hard for me to even really look at or observe. It's like looking in a mirror and watching myself helplessly and hopelessly try to bring myself out of the drowning abyss. Constantly doing my best to use whatever I have at my disposal to make it another 24. It reminds me of the countless hours, months, and years of therapy, medication, group therapy, meditation, you name it, I've tried it. But yet, still leaking all over the place trying to constantly pick myself up off of the floor. Reminds me too much of the depression, cries for help, and suicidal thoughts that I constantly deal with. Yet, as hard as it is to watch and look at, I can't stop. I just watch and cry.

Fun fact, over time the robot’s movements became less enthusiastic. Originally programmed to do a sort of “dance” as though it was happy and proud, it eventually began to slow down and seem tired and hopeless. And by 2019, almost like it died, it stopped working.

This piece makes me verge tears each time I run across it.

What a great video for such a great art piece. The commentary was very well spoken and intriguing.

I think this can symbolize the results of human behaviour. Because People these days just react. They don’t listen they just react to whatever situation they're in and feed their selfish desire. Nobody cares about anybody at least in my opinion. Example: Imagine a simulation and in that simulation, the creator of the simulation gathers a lot of people and gives them a kind of moral situation (or something like that) but with every simulation test those people end up doing the same thing which is: war (or anything related). The once beautiful environment in that simulation always ends up with a pool of dead bodies and a terrible setting. The blood is like the dead people and the Machine is the creator of the simulation cleaning up everything and getting ready to put other people in. The blood spreading away from the machine is to show how things never change. It keeps pulling it back to it but the liquid keep spreading away. It's just an endless loop of the same mistakes and ignorance. But the creator continues because they can’t help themselves. They hope and wish for a different ending? Do they search for an answer? I don’t really know how to explain it. There are some many other meanings that this beautiful artwork can have but this is the first thing that came to my head when I saw it.

这个作品太有感染力了 当时我站那看了很久 拽都拽不走

To Me this is like the machine got an oil spill and it’s trying to contain the oil but it is also panicking because it knows it will die in the end

I'm not crying you are

That's what it looks like

Alright if you see this and you're one of those people saying "you're so dumb for making this" no they arent. Art is expressive, sometimes emotional. Saying that this is dumb is saying that art isn't art.

my cousin committed suicide few days ago and instantly i know that this video is representing it all now, the days he's holding it, the enthusiasm before he figured he himself cant even help it, and it all stops now and let it just bleed for he cant handle it anymore...

3:51 their dynamic

挺喜欢这对夫妻艺术家的

早年间看到的中国艺术家，多年后在她博客上关注了，今天才认识到两者是同一人。

for me i see the piece as representing someone who dropped a bunch of things in a hall way and is picking it up while people walk past and not help and just keeps doing it itself till it runs out of energy to keep going

This is very interesting

And now I’m going to fill up a page or two and study this artwork

I like the concepts

This artwork makes me feel sad , for the robot … it’s like its trying to survive and pick up after itself over and over

Its like It's a reflection of people in society feeling stuck and struggling to keep going. Your job is something you don't like doing, but you feel like you have no choice or control over your life so all you can do is keep doing the same thing with the same negative mentality. Then eventually this robot will cease to work and would have worked all its life none stop until its end.

came from tiktok

very cool

ALL EFFORTS ARE POINTLESS AND MEANINGFUL. over time our problems appear in various ways, breaking us down and straining us, and no matter how hard we try, we get what we deserve. As humans, life is only an experience of what we believe to be real, and our desire for immortality is simply our desire to die happy.

It all changes with the context

I see something that has given so much that its now just desperately trying to keep all it has left, which is just it's lifeblood.

it feel like you try to keep your emotions from letting out when u cry

This helps me while having a breakdown

The never ending cycle and it needs someone to break it. I feel sad about this art knowing the history of it.

its like its done something it cant take back. it tries to fix it but cant and just spills again

Nicely-made video!

death always wins given time. life is about finding the balance so you do more than just fight against death, and instead best make use of the time you have, while holding on to as much as you can.

Welcome my son, welcome to the machine (If you know, you know)

I never wanted to hug a robotic arm so bad

It’s like it says it’s useless but it’s not, it was made to express feeling proud and happy you made to to the end but till someone destroys it and spills it and you have to try again and again till you give up and start losing yourself and you start getting tired and tired and then it’s till you actually feel useless and a disgrace not enough for this world. It’s like you have to keep going even though u want to give up don’t your enough your energy to the earth if you weren’t here, this world wouldn’t be like it is rn. Don’t give up now, your enough don’t let anyone ruin your life. This robot is an example of ur life of what ur gonna go through but the robot is basically like “don’t give up” but it’s called “i cant help myself” maybe what u feel but like everyone goes through that like what if u don’t got parents or moms or dads or anything but urself. You have to go through your life urself you should start being proud of yourselves you guys are something.! Sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and accept it..

It has emotions 😔

very good translation

hope your lives and masterpiece will be portrayed in a FILM! or is there already? hope i could watch it soon!

Nobody going to mention in the video the tv’s had videos of them building and taking apart klashnakovs.

this rules

21C needs this.

Having a really hard time reading white subtitles on a light colored background.

The robot really looked so happy cleaning all of that liquid stuff but now it's starting to slow down. I have a feeling it will start to destroy itself in the future

Why would an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving artist build this imperfect machine just so it would fail? Maybe this artist knew there was something more important than merely the mechanical success of this creation.

Guggenheim Bilbao please, please, please.....

this may also be intepreted as P-2: Wait of The World

Does anyone know what the liquid is?

Ngl i wonder if they change the liquid and what it is it kinda looks like blood but it’s to thick idk

在抖音滑到好幾次，機器表現兩個字＇徒勞'

heartbreaking

please, i'm confused about something. this video and the Guggenheim page suggest that the robot arm is trying to contain the fluid from flowing out beyond a certain perimeter, but another page says that the fluid is leaking from the robot and it has to keep replacing it or it sill cease to function. which is true, as i have also read that the robot eventually 'dies' due to lack of fluid?

Its very hard to read the subtitles

Didn’t know it was this big

So the fluid is really needed to keep it working? or is that just a metaphor.

I want to see it's final movements. Is that sadistic or does that not come into it because its a machine?

“Ok, let’s begin”

What is that liquid?

Жаль, что тут нет сабтитров на русском)

the cant help myself robot died on 2019 of overleaking now its called couldnt help myself

Radical

If it were manipulating marbles or sand instead of a liquid material that resembles blood, it wouldn’t have the same unnerving impact.

Is it blood or paint?

they keep pouring it. over and over again. I can’t clean it. I tried. my best. it’s never good.

こわいなあ……

Rip

I feel like the machine is me!

Poor machine rest in peace...

Robot: What is my purpose Artist: Keep the red liquid in the circle Robot: ... Oh my God Artist: Yeah, Welcome to the club pal

One says come on then the other says I'm tired:)

Why would u do that now the robot is tired

But I wonder why they called it I can’t help myself

Interesting how people now see machines as art

helo

oh ini yg viral di Tiktok 🧐

Why does the owner do that