Arts Thread

Flo is a pneumatic bubble mattress with a multi-functional performance, both sensing and actuating, to assist the moving and manual handling of immobile individuals thereby enhancing the symbiotic nature of the carer-patient relationship. Developed through a critical lens, Flo uses soft robotics to speculate on the future of care and how new material cultures could re-shape our relationships with support systems. Flo aims to create an interaction that feels intuitive and embodied, where users are not just being acted upon by the material, but rather they are engaged in a reciprocal relationship with it. The material responds, moves, and breathes alongside them; shifting the experience from a conscious act of control to something more rhythmic, fluid, and intertwined with the act of living. Flo’s materiality is intentionally provocative, asking: What is the future of care? How should we move, touch, and handle bodies and are we comfortable with these interactions? Silicone, with its uncanny, lifelike qualities, became central to this exploration. Its breathing, almost skin-like properties evoke both comfort and discomfort, sparking the very conversations about care, ethics, and touch that this project seeks to initiate.