The Social Contract

The Social Contract

14 February–23 February 2012

Artefact Festival, STUK arts centre, Leuven, Belgium | Website

Collaboration with Constant:

“Not only people but also bots, search engines and spiders abide by laws and agreements. Whether we email, surf or chat, rules and regulations have an effect on our daily lives and on the way we  move in public space. Which social behavior do governments, companies and regulators project on machines? What is the social contract written into standards and technological infrastructure?

In Connection Protocols, the Brussels-based arts lab Constant gathers research material on how people, machines and environments connect with each other. This collage  of artworks, notes, manuals, instructions, images and texts can be read as a publication that will be edited ‘live’ during the festival period. With this living collection that moves along the stairs of STUK, Constant tries to  balance ‘soft’ factors such as attraction, affection, similarity and curiosity with the prescriptive and indisputable character of formatting, contracts and ‘terms of use’ documents.”