The ADA Project
until 6 April
The Peninsula Hotel, Salisbury Road, Kowloon
The British artist Conrad Shawcross has brought his dancing robot to the lobby of the Peninsula Hotel. The ADA Project, which incorporates an industrial-strength robotic arm, will be “conducting” music by Mira Calix this week. Performances are due to take place at 3pm and 5pm on 23 March and during the evening of 24 March. At other times, the work will function in “salon mode”. Shawcross, who is in Hong Kong this week, says he is looking forward to people’s reactions when “they will be expecting to sit down for a cup of English tea”. Inspired by the pioneering 19th-century mathematician Ada Lovelace, who was the daughter of Lord Byron, The ADA Project’s Hong Kong debut is the second in a three-year partnership between London’s Royal Academy of Arts and the Peninsula. Last year’s surprise for the hotel’s guests was a vintage coach that balanced on the seventh floor of the façade, installed by Shawcross’s fellow Academician Richard Wilson. More Shawcross's work can be seen this week at Art Basel in Hong Kong (Victoria Miro, 3D04).