Lolo & Sosaku - AT LARGE

for Glamcult #143, the DEEPREAL issue

Lolo & Sosaku’s practice revolves around creating kinetic sculptures — machines that paint, generate sound, and perform. In their larger-than-life installations, the devices become living “entities with their own rhythm and presence.” Through them, the Barcelona-based duo explores what it means to make something that can, in a way, make itself. “We don’t try to hide the fact that it’s constructed, because the tension between the real and the simulated is exactly where the magic happens,” they speak on the duality of the mechanical body and the ephemeral output of their work.

They see machines as collaborators more so than tools, giving them space to develop their own temperament and quirks. “They have their own will — sometimes subtle, sometimes very loud. We set initial conditions, but then they take their own path,” the artists share. Authorship blurs as the line between creation and creator folds in on itself. The metal and motors may appear rigid, but what emerges is fluid. “Movement, sounds, and light [that] create a kind of hallucination — a temporary escape from fixed meaning,” they muse. They carve out conditions where reality wavers just enough to reveal its instability. “We like to think of this as a form of sensory poetry — where the senses are invited to wander and reinterpret what is ‘real.’”

Within this ethos, technology becomes an extension of the natural world. “Our machines spin like planets, vibrate like insect wings, echo the rhythms of the earth and cosmos. Technology is a way to re-experience nature through a different lens — it’s a conversation across scales and time,” they say. A motor’s vibration can feel like wind; wheels gliding like a tide. Their work bridges these forces, resulting in a meditation on cycles and how the mechanical can reflect the organic. Importantly, the artists recognise that “humans set the framework — the machines wouldn’t exist without us, and we decide their materials, colours, rhythms,” implying further inseparability of the two.

When encountering their work, Lolo & Sosaku hope to impart “a mix of curiosity, awe, and gentle disorientation” onto the viewer. “Our hope is to open a door to a new way of perceiving the world — one where the boundaries between the artificial and the organic start to dissolve.” Their installations ask for a slower kind of attention, a listening that goes beyond hearing, a seeing that touches something internal. To look with the body as much as with the eye. They don’t offer answers or direct interpretation; instead, they want you to question the meaning of authorship, authenticity, and the delicate balance between control and surrender.

Every element, even what might seem like empty space or background, plays an active role in Lolo & Sosaku’s work. The same applies to their studio, which they describe as “a living organism” in its own right. “The space shapes our work as much as we shape it. There’s an alchemy that happens — not just between us and the machines, but with the space itself. It’s not a neutral backdrop — it’s part of the work.”

Within the space of ambiguity their work embodies, Lolo & Sosaku reference early avant-garde explorations “that sought to disrupt habitual perception and open new modes of awareness.” They also come back to Borges’ The Circular Ruins, where the dreamer creates life only to learn he himself is dreamed — a loop of creation that mirrors their own dialogue between artist and machine.

The confusion and visual play in their sculptures is precisely where they want you to be. “We invite viewers to inhabit that threshold, where you can both trust what you see and doubt it at the same time. This paradox mirrors much of human experience — how our senses can deceive even as they connect us to the world.” Their work amplifies the subtle illusions of everyday life that often go unnoticed, making the familiar feel unfamiliar and alive.

“This relationship is deeply intuitive and requires a kind of humility — recognising that control is always partial,” Lolo & Sosaku reflect on their relationship to the machines they bring to life. Almost like parental figures, the artists have to practice trust and letting go, allowing space for surprise coming from their own creations.