A Perth performance artist has been spun around by a giant industrial robotic arm in a stomach-turning performance for an upcoming exhibition.

Stelarc, the head of the Alternate Anatomies Laboratory at Curtin University, said the performance, Propel, demonstrated an intimate interaction between the human body and a machine.

The Curtin University professor is also known for growing a human ear on his arm.

Stelarc spent about 30 minutes being harnessed to the $80,000 robot in a warehouse south of Perth.

"The human is responsible for programming the robot, but it's that connection between the body and machine that generates an artistic system," he said.

"The body is propelled in different trajectories. Sometimes my body is totally upside down, sometimes it's rotating on its axes and sometimes it's spun around."

Stelarc said he was a bit sore after the "jarring" experience.

He said there were some safety risks associated with the robot, which is usually used to slice foam, so engineering programmers were watching closely.

"Ordinarily with these robots, because there is a perceived safety problem, you shouldn't really be in the task envelope of the robot, not to mention being connected to the end of the robot arm," he said.

"So the programmers were there with their hands on the controller just in case something when wrong and they could hit the kill button ... not terminate me, but the robot."

Stelarc's previous art projects include growing a human ear on his arm. ( ABC News: Courtney Bembridge )

Stelarc said the robot could accelerate much faster than required, and extra tests were done before he was strapped on.

"It can be a very fast robot. Of course we weren't going at maximum speed ... my brain would have been mush," he said.

Humans and robots could soon become more intimate and interactive with the growth in robotic technology, Stelarc predicted.

"In the near future, technology may become invisible as it might be micro-sized and nano-sized [to] your body," he said.

"Now it's all external to our bodies, but having this intimate interface with robots is our first step towards ingesting our technology."

A large foam ear that is a replica of the ear grown on Stelarc's arm was also connected to the robot before performing the same choreography.

Both performances were recorded for the exhibition DeMONSTRABLE, opening at the University of Western Australia today, with the robot and programming engineers loaned from Autronics.