History

PIX18 is the brainchild of roboticist Hod Lipson. PIX18 is the third incarnation of a thee generations of robot artists, starting with SEURAT (2008), Pixasso (2012) and PIX18 (2016-). SEURAT was conceived and designed by Hod Lipson and then-student Carlos Aguilar. When Carlos graduated, Hod sought to re-implement the project with more autonomy. Unfortunately, it was not easy to find a student to continue the project - Engineering students shied away from art, and Art students shied away from engineering. After a few years, Hod decided to implement the second robot himself. The second robot, known as PIXASSO was a 12-foot gantry, and painted large paintings such as the Blue Cat and the Red Apples. When Hod moved to NYC, he scrapped the large robot and built the third system, known as PIX18. 

Hod Lipson Keynoting at the Tencent annual summit, Nov 2017