Robyn Taylor is a former research associate at Open Lab, Newcastle University, having recently completed a NSERC postdoctoral fellowship at the laboratory. Her research interests combine her two passions: music and technology. Robyn began exploring the use of participatory performance as an investigatory medium after years of studying and working as a professional vocalist. She uses a practice-based approach, combining participant interaction with live performance in order to research HCI issues surrounding creative agency, engagement, and social encounters in public spaces. Robyn has performed throughout Europe and North America, including festival performances of her interactive multimedia art in Canada, England, France, Germany, Spain and Mexico.

Wired UK praised humanaquarium, her collaboration with Guy Schofield and John Shearer, as a “compelling, if slightly sinister-sounding piece of psychedelic ambience”, with Steampunk Magazine calling the work “beautiful, breathtaking and utterly haunting.” In 2012 she completed her doctorate at the Advanced Man-Machine Interface Laboratory at the University of Alberta, Canada. Robyn’s work has been supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Alberta Ingenuity, iCore, and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts.