🎨Creative and installation use

Playtronica devices have appeared in art installations, contemporary performance, sound art exhibitions, and generative music projects since 2014. This page covers the patterns we see most.

Where Playtronica has shown up

Selected institutional and brand work from the last decade — the kinds of partners we have built bespoke setups for.

Museums and festivals

• Centre Pompidou (Paris) — MИR: A Journey into Space and Sound, summer 2018. A month-long sound installation built around touch, with a public version of TouchMe in the foyer. Coverage on FactMag.
• Palais de Tokyo (Paris) — workshops and performance, ongoing collaboration with the contemporary arts programme.
• Garage Museum of Contemporary Art (Moscow) — The Rhythm of Color workshop series with Orbita prototypes.
• Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow) — sound installation in dialogue with the permanent collection.
• Exploratorium (San Francisco) — interactive science-and-music station.
• Sónar+D (Barcelona) — the festival's innovation wing. Playtronica was founded in 2014 by Sasha Pas after seeing the first Sónar+D, so the relationship runs deep.

Brand performances and installations

• Hermès — a live performance inside the Manhattan flagship; Hermès accessories became the instruments for a three-hour Playtronica improvisation.
• Issey Miyake — a Tokyo collaboration tying sound to the raw materials of the garments, honoring the ancestral link between music and nature.
• IKEA — interactive product launches and pop-ups.
• Nike — event activations.

If your project sits in any of these adjacent categories — museum acquisition, festival commission, brand activation, university research — we are happy to talk early.

Use multiple devices at once

Each Playtronica device has a unique USB identity. You can run several devices at the same time. In Ableton, or in any MIDI-routing tool (MIDI-OX on Windows, Patchwork on macOS), each device appears as a separate MIDI input. Assign each device to a different instrument, effect chain, or visual trigger.

Installation setup tips

• Use USB hubs with individual power switches for reliable power management. A powered USB hub with its own power adapter is more stable than a passive hub.
• Test every alligator-clip connection before opening. Humidity changes affect conductivity. Re-test on the day.
• For long-running installations, route MIDI into a dedicated laptop running Ableton in performance mode. Disable the screensaver. Disable sleep.
• Lower sensitivity during busy hours if Biotron is part of the installation. Crowd interference can trigger false notes.
• Schedule preset changes through the day using SysEx on Biotron. See Biotron Advanced.

MIDI routing and custom instruments

Playtronica devices send standard MIDI — Note On, Note Off, velocity, and optional Continuous Control. This means they work with any MIDI-capable software: Max/MSP, Pure Data, SuperCollider, TouchDesigner, Resolume, Ableton, and many others. The creative ceiling is effectively unlimited.

Talk to us about a project

We have helped artists with bespoke setups for festivals, galleries, and performances. Email [email protected] with the subject Installation — [your project]. We reply within 2 business days.

Ask the community

🤝 Other Playtronica users have probably hit this before. The Playtronica Friends Facebook group has 4,400 members and is the fastest source of creative and technical help. Search the group's history first (use the magnifying glass at the top — try playtron mobile no sound, all leds lit, touchme biotron no sound, koala sampler midi, or whatever fits your problem). If your question is not already answered, post a new one with a [Device] prefix in the title. See the community page for what to ask there and what to email instead.

Still stuck

Email [email protected]. We aim for 24 hours, but a reply may take up to 3 business days.