Greensboro has a new resident: a giant robot and its winged companion. It's the latest public artwork to be unveiled in the Gate City.
The playful stainless steel sculpture "May-Bee and the Bot (In the Uncanny Valley)" is 28 feet tall, and glistens in the sun. Bot is kneeling, waving to passersby along the Downtown Greenway at West Market Street.
Its eyes stare up to the top of its head where a large honey bee sits with outstretched wings. Visitors can turn a hand crank on Bot’s leg and make the bee’s wings flutter.
It’s the brainchild of Portland-based artist and engineer Pete Beeman, who completed the installation over the weekend.
"It is so satisfying to start a conversation with some nice people in a nice place — that's an interesting place — and then work through that, and a year later, put a giant 3000-pound thing in the ground, and have it be enjoyed," says Beeman. "Like that is just fantastic to go all the way from the start all the way to the finish."
Beeman says the honeybee symbolizes the natural world and the challenges it faces. The robot represents technology and the questions surrounding AI’s future. He says bringing the two together, nature and technology, made sense here, where the Greenway connects the city’s downtown and residential areas.
"So for me, there's this other layer where I'm thinking about it, a lot of layers deeper that I know very few people are going to see," he says. "So what I want on a front level is that they see something that they don't see every day. You know, that you walk around the corner, you're like, 'Oh, what the heck is that thing? What is going on here?' And then, especially if it's followed with a smile, you know?"
Thanks to lighting around the installation, visitors can view May-Bee and the Bot both day and night. The project was funded by the nonprofit The Cemala Foundation and others.