bennett harrisSystems Artist

I build to understand.

Working across objects, infrastructure and machine intelligence.

Bennett Harris pulling a duvet from beneath the Pillow Perch

B.A.W.HARRISWHERE I'M ATBH·01

I am severely neurodivergent. The challenges this created shaped the course of my life and led me to spend more time understanding the world through form than through reading and writing.

I learned through objects, materials, movement and systems. Making became my way of thinking, communicating and capturing patterns that already exist in nature, people and everyday life.

Art, technology, engineering, manufacturing and design are not separate paths to me. They are different parts of a wider mission to explore ideas, create useful forms and improve how people experience the world.

Wherever my work takes me, I will continue to make, question and experiment.

Sincerely,

One practice, Many systems.

Grey lines connect ideas to projects. Craftsmanship runs through all of it.

Work · 01

Project Palma

Taking the open source ORCA hand and running new models on it: staying in touch with the bleeding edge of robotics through hardware priced like a phone.

In development · first build under way

see it

The ORCA v1 hand holding a ball, black and white

Work · 02

KIJIO

A twelve year venture developing mobility products, deployable infrastructure and manufacturing relationships intended to make movement and everyday life more comfortable.

Manufacturing and development agreements signed · August 2026

see it

Product render of a KIJIO travel adapter in black

Work · 03

Private
Inferencing
Core

A personally owned machine intelligence infrastructure project designed to keep data, memory and inference under local control.

In development · working core, proposed expansion

see it

Mac Studio on a black desk stand, the machine at the centre of the core

Grant 3.0

PROFESSOR GRANT

A private digital butler that turns scattered information into a focused daily briefing, working plan and personal learning system.

Working · conversational layer in development

see it

Work · 05

1D Mini

A complete video game constrained to a single line of LEDs.

Completed · first year project

see it

1D Mini: the acrylic wedge with its LED strip lit, electronics visible inside

Nine years of factory floors.

Not one trip. A working relationship with Chinese manufacturing, built visit by visit since 2017, and still running. Tolerance, tooling, design for manufacture, and what a supplier will quietly change if you do not specify it.

2017First visit to Shenzhen. Factory relationships direct from the second trip onwards.

9Years of going back, across the whole of my working life so far.

12Supplier meetings on the most recent trip, twelve days in August 2026.

6Factory tours on that same trip, walking live production lines.

Other things

Container Studio

An international shipping container rebuilt as a private studio, office and fabrication space.

In development · working environment

see it

Render of a blue shipping container with an open glowing door and roof antenna

LSBU Year One

A compact record of first year experiments across product design, display, interaction and domestic systems.

Teaching year completed · assessments incomplete · 2025/26

see it

Bennett working at a laptop in the LSBU studio

Things I've learned

FabricationCADLaser cuttingElectronicsSolderingMachine intelligencePhysical computingManufacturingRepairEngineering drawingDesign for manufactureTolerance and fitAssembly documentationAdditive manufactureMicrocontrollersSensors and actuatorsFabricationCADLaser cuttingElectronicsSolderingMachine intelligencePhysical computingManufacturingRepairEngineering drawingDesign for manufactureTolerance and fitAssembly documentationAdditive manufactureMicrocontrollersSensors and actuatorsFabricationCADLaser cuttingElectronicsSolderingMachine intelligencePhysical computingManufacturingRepairEngineering drawingDesign for manufactureTolerance and fitAssembly documentationAdditive manufactureMicrocontrollersSensors and actuatorsFabricationCADLaser cuttingElectronicsSolderingMachine intelligencePhysical computingManufacturingRepairEngineering drawingDesign for manufactureTolerance and fitAssembly documentationAdditive manufactureMicrocontrollersSensors and actuators

WritingSystems mappingConstructionVideoSoundInteractionPrototypingProduct photographyWritingSystems mappingConstructionVideoSoundInteractionPrototypingProduct photographyWritingSystems mappingConstructionVideoSoundInteractionPrototypingProduct photographyWritingSystems mappingConstructionVideoSoundInteractionPrototypingProduct photography

…and I'm always gathering more.

My why

I am not moving away from design or technology. I am working to question both of them more deeply.

My work has increasingly moved beyond solving functional problems. I want to understand what the systems I build mean, how they affect people, and where art can return humanity, ambiguity and emotion to technological work.

read my why

About me

I am a British, Canadian and Jamaican systems artist and designer based in Reading.

My work has developed across an Atlantic network of people, places and industries, from manufacturing relationships in China to technology, construction, hospitality and independent product development in Britain, Canada, the Caribbean and the United States.

more about me