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Designer Kacie Kinzer built thisTweenbotfrom cardboard, paper, ink, batteries, motor and wheels. The mute, omnidirectional robot carries a flag marking its destination; Manhattan bystanders adjust the robot's position so it will stay on the proper path.

Sam the homeless robot has plenty of practice walking up to passers-by in New York City. Now the 10-inch roving automaton with the friendly smile will greet an entirely new group of strangers as it takes a place among the strange interactive machines on display at the Museum of Modern Art’s Talk to Me exhibition.

New York designer Kacie Kinzer, who built the cardboard Tweenbot, told Wired.com she deliberately kept the design as simple as possible. “I wanted to introduce empathetic characters on the streets of New York City,” she said in an e-mail. “This disruption created an opportunity for people to step outside of their routines and be playful, curious and engaged in an unexpected way.”

In addition to Kinzer’s robots, Talk to Me gathers smart objects from around the world that illustrate the symbiosis between man and machine, including a text-to-speech finger implant and a conceptual interface for recording sensations felt in amputees’ phantom limbs.

MoMA curator Paola Antonelli summarized the show’s theme in her written introduction to Talk to Me (.pdf): “21st century culture is centered on interaction: ‘I communicate, therefore I am.’ Objects and systems that were once charged only with formal elegance and functional soundness are now expected to have personalities.”

Check the gallery above for a sampling of ingenious pieces from the Talk to Me show, which runs through Nov. 7

Images courtesy Museum of Modern Art