SPILLING THE TEA? A Soft Material Experience

SPILLING THE TEA? A Soft Material Experience is a 2026 LIT Ars Electronica Festival project grounded in years of exoskeleton research at the LIT Robopsychology Lab and plays on the dual meaning of ‘spilling the tea’ – both the physical act of pouring and the metaphorical act of revealing secrets – to surface the inherent ambivalence in the perception of textile wearable robotics (e.g., empowerment vs. vulnerability). Robotic textile gloves are placed in a cozy tea salon modeled on the Mad Tea Party from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland to create an exciting, immersive, multi-user setting that contrasts with typical technical and rigid presentation formats. By embedding the experience in a widely recognizable cultural ritual – the shared act of drinking tea – it invites visitors from diverse cultural backgrounds to engage sensorially with the emotional, cognitive, and societal implications surrounding soft wearable robotics.