In Conversation with Professor Inami and Stelarc
Knowledge hubPanel discussion
Professor Masahiko Inami and Stelarc • 03 Mar 2026
Recorded live at the National Communication Museum (NCM), this conversation brings together Professor Masahiko Inami, leader of the JIZAI Body Project, and internationally renowned Australian artist Stelarc, for a discussion on body augmentation, robotics and embodied intelligence.
Drawing on their shared interest in prosthetics, wearable systems and alternative anatomical architectures, Professor Inami and Stelarc reflect on how technologies can extend and reimagine what the human body can do.
The conversation touches on projects including the JIZAI Body Project’s JIZAI ARMS and Sixth Finger, as well as Stelarc’s earlier body-based performance works. It opens up broader questions around agency, co-emergence, telepresence, liveness and the future of human–machine relationships.
Introduced by NCM’s Senior Curator Jemimah Widdicombe, who also curated FRIEND (the exhibition in which works from the JIZAI Body Project are on display), this event formed part of NCM’s 2026 program of conversations at the forefront of robotics and embodied intelligence.
About
Professor Masahiko Inami
Special Advisor to the President for The University of Tokyo, Deputy Director / Professor for Advanced Science and Technology
Professor Inami completed a doctoral program at the Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, earning a Ph.D. in Engineering. After serving at the University of Electro-Communications and Keio University, he has held his current position since 2016. Professor Inami’s areas of interest include technologies for augmenting the human body, human augmentation engineering and entertainment engineering.
He is the recipient of several prestigious awards including TIME magazine’s “Coolest Invention of the Year,” the Young Scientists’ Award from the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), and the MEXT Prize for Science and Technology (Research Category). Professor Inami also serves as a board member of the Information Processing Society of Japan and a cooperating member of the Science Council of Japan. His publications include “The Birth of Superhumans! Humans Surpass Science Fiction” (NHK Publishing) and “Theory of JIZAI Body” (Springer) among others.
Professor Inami is the Research Director of the ERATO Inami JIZAI Body Project that aims to to establish a technological foundation for building a "freeing body" that can be adapted to our “smart society”, utilising assistive robotics, wearable computing, brain information decoding, machine learning, virtual reality, and other technologies. The research has unfolded across over 100 themes and produced projects such as JIZAI ARMS, Pick Hits, Sixth Finger and the film JIZAI that are currently on display in FRIEND.
Stelarc
Performance artist
Stelarc's projects explore alternative anatomical architectures. He has performed and exhibited in Japan, Korea, China, Europe, the USA, South America and Australia. He is acknowledged internationally as a pioneer in Performance, Media Arts and by the Augmented Humans research community. He has used biomedical instruments, prosthetics, robotics, virtual systems and the internet for his projects and performances. In 2010 he was awarded the Ars Electronica Golden Nica Hybrid Arts award for his Ear On Arm project.
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