Regular Animals: Beeple’s Wild AI Robot Dogs Expose How Tech Really Sees Us

Regular Animalsis one of Beeple’s boldest projects yet. The installation mixes artificial intelligence, robotics, dark humor, and cultural critique into a lively, chaotic scene. When it premiered at Art Basel Miami Beach 2025, it quickly drew attention from curious visitors, sparked debate, and attracted collectors ready to spend six figures on an edition. This artwork is anything but subtle. It challenges viewers, pokes fun at the tech industry, highlights how digital systems shape our lives, and manages to make you laugh along the way.

The project uses animatronic creatures, hyper-real masks of famous figures, real-time neural processing, and NFT output to make a point: algorithms shape how the world sees us, and we often have no idea what they’re doing.

What Is Regular Animals?

Regular Animals is an interactive artwork created by Beeple (Mike Winkelmann), the digital artist best known for Everydays: The First 5000 Days—the landmark NFT collage that sold for $69.3M at Christie’s in 2021. He’s spent years building a reputation for tech-driven satire and dystopian commentary. This installation expands his focus from screens to physical machines.

The piece debuted on December 3, 2025 inside Art Basel Miami Beach’s new Zero10 digital art section. Every edition sold out during the VIP preview at $100,000 each, highlighting just how strong the demand remains for Beeple’s hybrid digital-physical projects.

What visitors encountered wasn’t a quiet gallery. They stepped into a fenced pen filled with 10 animatronic “dogs”—flesh-toned, humanoid robots wearing uncannily lifelike masks of tech moguls, art legends, and Beeple himself. These machines walked, watched, captured images of viewers, processed them through AI, and then printed the results from their rear ends as satirical “poop” accompanied by blockchain certification.

It’s absurd. It’s biting. It’s strangely insightful.

Why Beeple Created Regular Animals

Beeple has spent over a decade critiquing how technology influences culture. His earlier pieces—especially those exploring AI gone wrong—leaned heavily on digital storytelling. Regular Animals switches to physical hardware because the stakes of modern tech feel more concrete than ever.

A core message threads through the entire experience:
“We are not prepared for the future.”

Algorithms already filter our social media, shape our opinions, and reinforce hidden biases. Tech platforms have a huge impact. Beeple turns these forces into actual creatures that wander, watch, and produce twisted versions of your identity. By putting viewers inside the system, he shows how odd and vulnerable life in the algorithm age can be.

How the Animatronic System Works

Each robot has several components working together:

1. Movement and Behavior

• Quadruped frame capable of simple locomotion

• Wandering patterns based on programmed curiosity

• Cameras mounted at eye level

These dogs don’t behave realistically. Their odd, humanoid textures and stiff movements create a slight uncanny-valley effect. Beeple leans into that discomfort.

2. Real-Time Image Capture

Every robot snaps pictures of visitors and the surrounding space. The process isn’t subtle. People notice the gaze and often respond to it. That interaction becomes a core part of the commentary.

3. AI Processing “Through the Mask”

The captured images run through neural style systems calibrated to each figure:

• Elon Musk bot: chaotic, sci-fi visuals echoing X/Twitter’s unpredictable feeds

• Mark Zuckerberg bot: AR-like overlays that make fun of social network aesthetics

• Jeff Bezos bot: consumer-surveillance energy (this edition wasn’t for sale)

• Andy Warhol bot: repetitive pop prints

• Pablo Picasso bot: fractured perspectives and cubist distortion

• Beeple bots (x2): glitch-heavy self-mockery of NFT hype cycles

Each robot develops its own visual personality. This makes the output feel less like a gimmick and more like a running joke with cultural depth.

4. The “Poop” Output

The AI output emerges as:

• Physical prints: up to 1,028 per robot

• NFTs: up to 256 unique tokens per robot

• Blockchain receipts: humorously labeled as “100% pure GMO-free, organic dogshit”

This crude joke works because it turns the idea of valuable blockchain art on its head. The dogs 'produce' culture while people gather to collect it. It’s both a parody and a comment on how digital economies treat attention like money.

The Masks and Their Symbolism

The masks come from @LHyperflesh, a sculptor famous for unsettlingly realistic designs. Beeple called him the “absolute GOAT” for good reason—these masks blur recognition and distortion in a way that enhances the satire.

Why These Figures?

They represent different forces shaping modern perception:

• Tech billionaires control major digital platforms.

• Art pioneers shaped visual language before the algorithmic era.

• Beeple himself sits in the middle as a figure often blamed or praised for the NFT explosion.

Each mask is a stand-in for cultural power. The robots act as exaggerations of their influence.

The Lifespan System

The robots work for three years. After that, or '21 dog years,' their AI and printing features shut down for good. They can still walk, but they stop making images or tokens.

This limit is intentional. Technology changes quickly, and even the best systems can feel outdated before they are fully developed. Beeple uses this planned 'death' to show how fast digital tools lose their importance.

Audience Response and Media Coverage

Crowds packed the Zero10 section throughout the fair. Videos of the Musk and Zuckerberg bots “pooping” prints spread across X, Instagram, TikTok, and Reddit. Headlines ran with phrases like:

• “Terrifying robot dogs”

• “NFT crap takes over Miami”

• “Beeple’s bots steal Art Basel”

Collectors picked up prints as soon as they appeared. Some people waited for hours to get a specific robot’s output. Others recorded their friends’ reactions to seeing the animatronics for the first time.

Critics liked the timing. Regular Animals arrived after a year full of debates about AI rules, data privacy, and how algorithms work. Beeple’s satire touched on issues people were already thinking about.

How Regular Animals Fits Into Beeple’s Larger Body of Work

Beeple’s 2025 projects, Diffuse Control and Synthetic Theatre, have similar themes to Regular Animals. They look at digital independence, cultural worries, and the struggle between human choices and machine decisions. This installation is unique because it combines software and robotics on a scale Beeple hasn’t tried before.

Moving from 2D digital images to large mechanical works marks a new stage in his career. This artwork makes AI something you can experience in person. You don’t just scroll by—it surrounds you.

Key Themes Embedded in the Work

1. Algorithmic Power

Tech platforms shape public perception. The robots illustrate how a handful of gatekeepers filter reality, often with bias or opacity.

2. Surveillance Culture

The dogs watch viewers. People feel it. The slight discomfort mirrors how targeted ads, social trackers, and facial-recognition systems watch us daily.

3. Commodity Culture

Visitors scramble for printed “poop.” Beeple critiques how digital scarcity and hype twist value—even when the object is intentionally crude.

4. Mortality in Digital Systems

The programmed lifespan challenges the assumption that digital creations live forever.

5. Tech Idolatry

Giving billionaires animal bodies exaggerates how society treats these individuals as larger-than-life symbols.

Why Regular Animals Matters

This installation sits at the intersection of art, technology, and public debate. It’s both funny and pointed. Beeple isn’t just looking for attention—he’s creating experiences that show how odd today’s tech culture really is.

Regular Animals offers an experience you feel, not just understand. The blend of AI, robotics, satire, and audience participation sets a benchmark for future hybrid installations.