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INNOVATION ECONOMY

Start-ups find niche where art and technology meet

By Scott Kirsner

 |  Globe Correspondent  

  December 11, 2011

In an industrial building on the South Boston waterfront, a Japanese-made robotic arm performs the same task that Roman slaves once did for their emperors - crafting tiles into mosaics. The robot, however, does it much faster. While new technology often seems to add more stress and complexity to our lives, a quartet of Boston-area companies are putting technology in the service of beauty, making visual art more affordable, pervasive, and comprehensible.

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