KINDASA
01_KINDASA_Nurah_Farahat.png | Credits: Nurah Farahat
02_KINDASA_Nurah_Farahat.png | Credits: Nurah Farahat
03_KINDASA_Nurah_Farahat.png | Credits: Nurah Farahat
04_KINDASA_Nurah_Farahat.png | Credits: Nurah Farahat
05_KINDASA__AlJazari_Robot_Band_Public_Domain.png | Credits: Public Domain
06_Kindasa_AlJazari_Public_Domain.png | Credits: Public Domain
07_Kindasa_AlJazari_Public_Domain.png | Credits: Public Domain
08_02_KINDASA_Nurah_Farahat.png | Credits: Nurah Farahat
KINDASA (كنداسة – derived from the Latin “condensare”)
The first automated humanoid robot was a 12th-century musical band. A water-operated programmable drum machine with wooden pegs and levers that controlled percussion. The drummers could be made to play different rhythms and patterns simply by rearranging the pegs. This ‘robot band’ could perform more than fifty facial and body actions during each musical selection.
Ismail Al-Jazari invented and recorded over 100 devices, shaping the foundations of mechanical engineering. Thanks to the centuries-long Translation Movement and vibrant trade and cultural relations, he built his work upon Egyptian, Greek, Persian, Indian, and Chinese engineering.
The result was water-operated clocks (for worshippers to know the prayer times), perpetual flute machines, drum machines, fountains, hand washing devices, and machines for raising water from ponds, rivers, and flowing canals, the crankshaft (essential to all modern piston and car engines), the flushing mechanism, multi-dial combination locks, and many more.
Like Al-Jazari’s clocks and musical automata, I compose using mechanical descriptions without timelines, grids, or fixed BPMs. Instead, I weave sets of rules to build a “musical-visual automaton” to generate each scene dynamically. Through these rules, I simulate and regulate rhythms, visuals, movement, and progression procedurally—sometimes in feedback loops. Moving arms, blinking, eye contact or avoidance, birds, sky, wind, gravity, physics, time… all carefully woven and puppeteered together in the form of a 45-minute live audiovisual performance.
KINDASA (كنداسة – derived from the Latin “condensare”)
The first automated humanoid robot was a 12th-century musical band. A water-operated programmable drum machine with wooden pegs and levers that controlled percussion. The drummers could be made to play different rhythms and patterns simply by rearranging the pegs. This ‘robot band’ could perform more than fifty facial and body actions during each musical selection.
Ismail Al-Jazari invented and recorded over 100 devices, shaping the foundations of mechanical engineering. Thanks to the centuries-long Translation Movement and vibrant trade and cultural relations, he built his work upon Egyptian, Greek, Persian, Indian, and Chinese engineering.
The result was water-operated clocks (for worshippers to know the prayer times), perpetual flute machines, drum machines, fountains, hand washing devices, and machines for raising water from ponds, rivers, and flowing canals, the crankshaft (essential to all modern piston and car engines), the flushing mechanism, multi-dial combination locks, and many more.
Like Al-Jazari’s clocks and musical automata, I compose using mechanical descriptions without timelines, grids, or fixed BPMs. Instead, I weave sets of rules to build a “musical-visual automaton” to generate each scene dynamically. Through these rules, I simulate and regulate rhythms, visuals, movement, and progression procedurally—sometimes in feedback loops. Moving arms, blinking, eye contact or avoidance, birds, sky, wind, gravity, physics, time… all carefully woven and puppeteered together in the form of a 45-minute live audiovisual performance.
Sound engineering: Michael Häßler
Vocals: Alaa Abdullatif
Special thanks: Frieder Nake, Daito Manabe, Ata Ebtekar, David Elgawly, Forecast Platform
With support from: Goethe Institute Kairo; Senator für Kultur Bremen; Nordmedia CLOSEUP:Bremen; Senatorin für Wirtschaft, Hafen und Transformation-Bremen
Nurah Farahat (EG) is an Egyptian audiovisual artist, game developer, event organizer, and VJ based in Bremen, Germany. She studied traditional animation and sound design in Cairo (2014) while active in the city’s electronic/club scene. In parallel, she explored generative sound, animation, and “non-game” simulation (including at the Institute for AI-Bremen 2018–2020), leading to her solo AV project KINDASA. Since 2018, she has notably collaborated with artist M.I.A. on various graphics and projects, and has VJed and coordinated her live shows worldwide since 2022.
Nurah Farahat (EG) is an Egyptian audiovisual artist, game developer, event organizer, and VJ based in Bremen, Germany. She studied traditional animation and sound design in Cairo (2014) while active in the city’s electronic/club scene. In parallel, she explored generative sound, animation, and “non-game” simulation (including at the Institute for AI-Bremen 2018–2020), leading to her solo AV project KINDASA. Since 2018, she has notably collaborated with artist M.I.A. on various graphics and projects, and has VJed and coordinated her live shows worldwide since 2022.
KINDASA is a work inspired by the philosophies of 12th-century engineer and polymath Ismail Al-Jazari. It explores new methods of real-time audio/visual processing, reimagining his legacy through contemporary performance. Al-Jazari created what is considered to date the first automated humanoid robot—a water-operated, programmable drum machine that used wooden pegs and levers to control percussion, allowing musicians to play different rhythms and patterns by rearranging the pegs at hand. His “robot band” could perform over fifty facial and body gestures during a single musical piece. Nurah Farahat readapts this method to create a real time operated performance sequence inspired by Al-Jazari’s mechanical imagination as a compositional model. Like his automata and clocks, her processes avoid timelines, BPMs, and traditional grids. New algorithmic rules are set to generate a “musical-visual automaton” in real time where each scene unfolds dynamically through these rules—simulating rhythms, visuals, movement, and progression, often in recursive feedback loops. Over his lifetime, Al-Jazari designed more than 100 mechanical devices, laying the groundwork for modern mechanical engineering. Drawing on Egyptian, Greek, Persian, Indian, and Chinese innovations—transmitted through the vibrant cultural and scientific Translation Movement—he invented water clocks to mark prayer times, perpetual flute machines, automata, hand-washing devices, water-lifting machines, crankshafts, early flushing mechanisms, combination locks, and more.
KINDASA is a work inspired by the philosophies of 12th-century engineer and polymath Ismail Al-Jazari. It explores new methods of real-time audio/visual processing, reimagining his legacy through contemporary performance. Al-Jazari created what is considered to date the first automated humanoid robot—a water-operated, programmable drum machine that used wooden pegs and levers to control percussion, allowing musicians to play different rhythms and patterns by rearranging the pegs at hand. His “robot band” could perform over fifty facial and body gestures during a single musical piece. Nurah Farahat readapts this method to create a real time operated performance sequence inspired by Al-Jazari’s mechanical imagination as a compositional model. Like his automata and clocks, her processes avoid timelines, BPMs, and traditional grids. New algorithmic rules are set to generate a “musical-visual automaton” in real time where each scene unfolds dynamically through these rules—simulating rhythms, visuals, movement, and progression, often in recursive feedback loops. Over his lifetime, Al-Jazari designed more than 100 mechanical devices, laying the groundwork for modern mechanical engineering. Drawing on Egyptian, Greek, Persian, Indian, and Chinese innovations—transmitted through the vibrant cultural and scientific Translation Movement—he invented water clocks to mark prayer times, perpetual flute machines, automata, hand-washing devices, water-lifting machines, crankshafts, early flushing mechanisms, combination locks, and more.