A Constructed Response: Designing and Choreographing Robot Arm Movements in Collaborative Dance Improvisation

In dance, dancers improvise and choreograph with each other, prototyping movement designs with each other. These interactions extend into collaboration with technology to enhance the creative process. We want to understand how dancers design and improvise movements together in the case of working with a robotic arm, which serves as an instrument in the stage space capable of non-humanoid movements. We engaged and observed dancers in a workshop to co-create movements with robots in one-human-to-one-robot and three-human-to-one-robot settings. We found that dancers produced more fluid movements in one-to-one scenarios, experiencing a stronger sense of connection and presence with the robot as a co-dancer. Conversely, in three-to-one scenarios, the dancers divided their attention between the human dancers and the robot, resulting in increased perceived use of space and more stop-and-go movements, perceiving the robot as part of the stage background. This work highlights how technologies can drive creativity in movement artists as they adapt to new ways of working with instruments, extending prior research on dancing with inanimate objects by exploring how robotic arms influence creative collaboration. We contribute insights into designing systems that support improvisational processes and artistic collaborations with non-humanoid agents.