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Worship Humanity's New Gods At Red Hook's Robotic Church
By
John Del Signore
Published Oct 12, 2015
Modified Oct 12, 2015
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By
John Del Signore
Published Oct 12, 2015
Modified Oct 12, 2015
Share
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Artist Chico MacMurtrie threw open the doors to his mysterious "Robotic Church" in Red Hook over the weekend, welcoming a handful of robot devotees into his sacred studio space, where machines perform glorious machine music for the edification of their mortal worshipers. MacMurtrie spent almost two decades (between 1987 and 2006) building his 35 kinetic robot sculptures, and on rare occasions he invites spectators to see his menagerie in action. It all takes place inside a 19th-century Norwegian Seaman's Church on Pioneer Street which doubles as a robot-sculpture collective workshop.
"The Robotic Church is an ode to the power of the architecture of the church," MacMurtrie writes in his artist's statement. "It is a parallel with what we are really familiar with and what we are getting far away from. We are getting further and further away from human contact and we are more interested in our contact with machines."
The series of concerts were produced by Atlas Obscura, which described the experience as "a caterwauling orchestra of futuristic junk life." Photographer Tod Seelie notes that "the little beasts that scraped along on the metal floor clearly unnerved some people."
If you'd like to stay abreast of future Robotic Church events, here's their Twitter and Facebook. For further reading, the NY Times profiled MacMurtrie in 2013.
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Chico MacMurtrie
robotic church
robots
tod seelie
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John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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