Daniel Simu
Special recognition for ambassador Daniel Simu of The robots are coming
Special recognition for ambassador Daniel Simu of The robots are coming
The robots are coming proudly welcomes Daniel Simu as official ambassador of the The robots are coming. As a maker and performance artist, Simu operates at the intersection of technology, mechanics and live act. His work brings robotics not as a finished product, but as a physical, vulnerable and relational experience, at the intersection where man and machine meet.
Daniel Simu's work is not object-centred, but relational. His performances revolve around the interaction between body, mechanics and audience, performed in real time. He builds his own mechanical and kinetic systems: visibly unfinished, with cables, motors, frames and drives that are explicitly part of the image. In doing so, he consciously positions himself outside classical robotics and industrial perfection. He does not see his machines as products, but dramaturgical instruments.
In his acts, Simu literally connects with his constructions. Think portable mechanical frames, exoskeleton-like systems and moving objects that react to his body, breathing and muscle power. Control and loss of it alternate. Failure is not a mistake, but part of the work. The performance balances between choreography, experiment and demonstration, where the audience does not see a finished story, but a process unfolding on the spot. With real forces, real mass and real consequences.
His work touches on pressing questions around autonomy, social engineering and technology in the human body. Instead of futuristic promises, Simu shows the friction: technology as extension, burden and negotiation partner at the same time. This makes his work ideally suited to contexts in which technology is critically, tangibly and publicly questioned; such as innovation festivals, public spaces and hybrid art-tech programmes.
In January 2026, at the Monte Carlo International Circus Festival, Daniel Simu received the Prix Pastorale, a prestigious international award for an act that excels in humanity, vulnerability and spiritual eloquence. The award underlines the emotional and existential impact of his work and confirms his position as an artist who uses technology to make fundamental human questions visible.
As ambassador of The robots are coming, Daniel Simu brings performance, mechanics and imagination together in Delft's public space. His contribution shows that robotics is not only smart or efficient, but also physical, confrontational and poetic. As such, his work forms an important content pillar within the The robots are coming: an invitation to not only understand technology, but also to experience it.
During The robots are coming, Simu will be involved in performances, installations and programming focusing on human-machine relationships. His work connects art, technology and society, contributing to a city-wide conversation about how we live together with increasingly intelligent systems.
With Daniel Simu as ambassador, The robots are coming gets a creator who does not glorify technology, but questions it, and who shows how innovation arises the moment control, vulnerability and imagination come together.