This woodblock print is titled “User Friendly”. It features three robots playing around with a human. Each robot is from a different point in time and space. The robot on the right is the future robot with an advanced design and telescoping arms. The one in the center is an alien design robot with tentacles and a single optical sensor. Finally, the robot on the left is the retro robot that relies on moving gears for internal mechanics and has outdated optical sensors and limited maneuverability. The retro robot is also the robot that’s featured on my first robot print, “Urban Robo”.
I wanted to make a piece that made the robots look more like children than towering monsters. Sure they’re enormous and emotionless, but they’re also limited in their memory capacity, and were created to help humans in their menial tasks. Basically they’re harmless, but they are large and curious, they think they’re helping us, but they don’t comprehend death or realize if they’re causing harm, making them dangerous.
The design for the print started out as a pencil sketch, and was redrawn on a large sheet of sketchpad paper, and transferred onto the woodblock with tracing paper.
The hatching in the background first seen in the “Urban Robo” print returns to not only continue the design in the first one, making it apparent that they’re part of an ongoing series, but also retain the original purpose of breaking up the large amount of flat black color surrounding the composition.