Spalanzani & Coppélius

Description

This bike rack was inspired by two characters from the opera, the Tales of Hoffmann by Jacques Offenbach. Spalanzani and Coppélius are a pair of shifty inventors who make a beautiful robot, Olympia, who sings like a goddess. This pair convince our hero Hoffmann to wear special glasses that help him fall in love with her, which, of course, ends in tragedy. Artist Pete Beeman says “I have been thinking of the bike rack guys as minions, or sidekicks. It is fun to think of them as the robot inventors, and a perfect match to my doubts about technology and artificial intelligence – what if they are the shifty inventors behind tech, selling us all rose colored glasses?”