As part of her MA work at the Design Academy Eindhoven, artist and graphic designer Echo Yang created a series titled Autonomous Machines where common analog devices like tin windup toys, a Walkman, an alarm clock and other machines were connected to writing and painting instruments. As each machine was set loose on a canvas its specialized motions were translated into brush strokes, paint blobs, and pencil marks resulting in self-generated artworks somewhat reminiscent of spirographs. While conceptual artists have long been recording the actions of machines, plants, wind and other moving objects to generate artwork, Yang’s painting wind-up chicken toy stands out as a superbly executed idea. It would be great to see a whole series of those. You can see many more painting vacuum cleaners, hand mixers and electric razors on her website. (via MOCO LOCO)