Explicitly—or not—protocols determine much of what we do. Far exceeding traditional notions of “good manners,” protocols are systems of language that regulate how we relate to each other, to our cultural, social, and political environments, and to the technologies that create them. The first publication to look at protocols across a wide range of disciplines, As for Protocols features essays, artworks, conversations, and scores by twenty-four international contributors who speak to protocols as practice—neither conventional mannerisms nor abstract concepts, but material processes, relational affinities, shared responsibilities, and mutual care. What emerges from the book’s pages are tools for empowerment, ways in which protocols can be rebooted, reengineered, embodied, appropriated, and used to our own ends. The launch brings together the book’s editors—Re’al Christian, Carin Kuoni, and Eriola Pira—with contributors: artist Salome Asega, scholar Shannon Mattern, performer Silas Riener, and artist Robert Sember of the sound art collective Ultra-red. Using the book as a generative prompt, performances, readings, a somatic activation, and dialogues with the contributors reflect on protocols through their technological, political, and social dimensions.
New York City, NY; NYC