With the new technologies, the arts have gone beyond their classic condition of "object to be contemplated" and have entered the field of direct interaction with the public and the environment, with which they build new languages and new aesthetic objects. This essay points out the enormous potential that robotics represents for the future of the arts and, through a historical, literary and aesthetic journey, shows the theoretical and practical proposals made by artists from the first automata of the 18th century to the latest cyborgs.