you're listening to TED Talks Daily where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day I'm your host Elise Hu the most influential puppets in my life are actually Muppets you know from Sesame Street or Kermit and Miss Piggy and their whole Jim Henson puppet universe they evoke all kinds of feelings and nostalgia childhood In this talk, artist and designer Fredette Lamp, who is part of the French street theater collective La Machine, reflects on what it means to create and build giant moving machines from fire -breathing sea dragons to slumbering minotaurs and why the kind of puppets
she makes go way beyond entertainment.
They can help reshape how people see their cities and one another.
banking with capital one helps you keep more money in your wallet with no fees or minimums on checking accounts and no overdraft fees just ask the capital one bank guy it's pretty much all he talks about in a good way he'd also tell you that this podcast is his favorite podcast too ah really thanks capital one bank guy what's in your wallet term supply see capital one .com slash bank capital one and a member fdic This message is brought to you by AppleCard. Each Apple product, like the iPhone 16, is thoughtfully designed by skilled designers.
The titanium AppleCard is no different.
It's laser -etched, has no numbers, and it earns you daily cash on everything you buy, including 3 % back on everything at Apple.
Apply for AppleCard on your iPhone in minutes.
Subject to credit approval, AppleCard is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch. Terms and more at applecard .com.
This episode is sponsored by Dell, introducing the new Dell AI PC, powered by the Intel Core Ultra processor.
It's not just an AI computer, it's a computer built for AI.
That means it's built to help do your busy work for you.
So you can fast forward through editing images, designing presentations, generating code, debugging code, running lots of apps without lag, creating live translations and captions, summarizing meeting notes, extending battery life, enhancing security, finding that file you were looking for, managing your scheduled while meeting your deadlines, responding to Jim's long emails, leaving all the time in the world for more you time and for the things you actually want to do.
No offense, Jim. Get a new Dell AI PC starting at $699 .99 at dell .com slash ai -pc.
How those ahead stay ahead.
Imagine one day you're out for a walk in a city you live or you visit and suddenly you came face to face with a giant minotaur.
He's half male, half bull.
His skin is made of wood.
He is walking, galloping, rearing up.
He opens and closes his blue eyes.
He breathes, he cries, he growls.
His arms can fend off traffic lights.
And now, he's asleep in front of the city hall, and people, on their way to work, hear the creature snoring.
Amazing. As tall as a building.
The city is a stage for him, and people are immersed in his world.
Thirty years ago, my colleague François de La Rozière, a designer, art performer, founded La Machine Company.
His aim? To create large theatre experiences in cities.
How? With huge animated machines.
Since then, François extraordinary machines appeared in streets, boulevards, avenues, all over the world.
These machines have no practical function at all.
They tell stories for cities and their citizens and they bring all communities together to create perhaps a new common ground.
In 2016, the French port of Calais commissioned us a permanent art project.
Two years later, the sea dragon appeared on the beach. He has two giant red rings and a long blue tail.
And he started his delightful promenades around the historic streets of Calais.
Spitting fire, smoke coming out of his body.
The Sea Dragon is now the new image of the city.
I could say that he belongs to the city, and he's loved by everyone.
Thank you. La Machine is based in Nantes, a French city on the Atlantic coast of France, and our workshop is in a former shipyard where we now build the great elephant, the giant spider, the dragon horse, the minotaur, the sea dragon, and others.
It's a permanent beehive with over 100 different trades and crafts involved.
In our staff, we have welders, musicians, physicians, mechanics, comedians, sculptors, engineers, roboticists, and so on.
Perhaps you would like to know how we make it.
First, a drawing, then a model.
The model is scanned to generate a digital wireframe.
Then we made wooden shells for the skin of the animal, a metal structure for the skeleton, including hydraulic and electrical systems to bring the machine to life.
Then the construction can begin.
The carpenters lead the way and other trades follow on.
It takes around two years from the design to the completion.
And then we are ready to operate a machine.
An average of 18 operators drive the machine with joysticks and exoskeletons.
One person per arm and per leg, one operator for the head, another one for the neck, one person for the wings, one person for special effects, one person for the tail, one pilot for the truck, one guide and a director of operation.
He is the soul of the machine.
He gives technical, but also emotional indications.
All operators are connected to him with mics to make a realistic movement.
Long Ma. Long Ma means dragon host in Chinese.
Perhaps it's my favorite machines.
Long Ma was commissioned by Beijing.
And then, with this machine, we performed in several cities in the world.
In Ottawa, Long Ma was joined by a giant spider that would settle on the roof of the cathedral.
Ottawa, the administrative capital of Canada, had a slogan at that time.
Ottawa is not boring.
Of course not. 700 ,000 people came to see Long Ma and discovered a giant spider.
Oh my God, they loved it!
Death shows are free.
No tickets, no fences.
It makes the city creative and inclusive.
For people experiencing a giant moving machine in their neighbourhood, it can change the way they see their own city.
La machine is not only about street performances.
We also develop large -scale spaces for ongoing moving exhibitions.
In Nantes, our home city, we created Les Machines de l 'Île.
Les Machines de l 'Île is a cultural facility to support the urban regeneration program of the city to make Nantes more attractive, both for inhabitants and visitors.
The cultural facility includes the great elephant, who is walking every day on the old dock Esplanade, and next to it, the carousel of the SeaWorld, with a living testimony to Jules Verne, who was born and grew up in Nantes.
Why are these machines so special?
Machines are movement.
The machines are not just art, not just entertainment.
They tell stories, but also, they bring emotion together in every person, from spaces and times.
Our machines are poetic figures, and poetry has no business plan.
But even after our show of three, they generate great benefits for shops, cafes, restaurants and huge free media coverage for cities.
In Liverpool, one day, a giant spider appeared magically on a building in front of the main train station.
Hundreds of thousands of people discovered the new face of Liverpool.
and this image went around the world.
Some cities with the machine wish to improve their image, like Ottawa, Calais or Liverpool.
Others choose urban planning issues like Nantes or Toulouse.
Toulouse is in the south of France and we presented to the mayor of Toulouse in 2013 the Minotaur.
Toulouse is the home of Airbus.
Like Seattle is the home for Boeing, and represented to the leader of aeronautics in Europe, an old and antique figure.
Crazy. Toulouse is an ancient city where myths and stories of bulls are central.
And this city is like a labyrinth.
The Minotaur makes the link between the past and the future.
Last October, we created a new character, the guardian of darkness, for the second part of the gigantic street opera.
The guardian of darkness is both a woman and a scorpion, and she is the alter ego of the Minotaur.
In La Machine we don't really use artificial intelligence, but we definitely use artistic intelligence to reimagine humanity.
Thank you. That was Fredette Lamp at TED 2025.
If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at TED .com slash curation guidelines.
And that's it for today's show.
TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective.
This episode was produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green Lucy Little Alejandra Salazar and Tonsica Sangmar Nivon It was mixed by Christopher Fasey -Bogan Additional support from Emma Taubner and Daniela Balorezo I'm Elise Hugh I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed Thanks for listening This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance Do you ever think about switching insurance companies To see if you could save some cash, Progressive makes it easy.
Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies.
The process only takes minutes, and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket.
Visit Progressive .com after this episode to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates.
Potential savings will vary.
Not available in all states.
We'll see you next week.
Hey it's Paige from Giggly Squad.
Real talk, if there's one store that I absolutely love walking around, it's Sephora.
It's my total guilty pleasure.
They have amazing brands that other people don't have, and I find something great every time I walk in.
And there's literally one down the street from me, so I do that a lot.
It's so fun to shop in the store and online, and the products are just too good.
No regrets ever. For example, one of my favorite beauty brands is Makeup By Mario, who just launched his new lip gloss that I absolutely love.
So the next time you're in the market for great beauty, shop all the hottest products and brands only at Sephora.
