Based on examples of contracts in the art world (e.g. The Artists Contract by Seth Siegelaub) we will look for clearly expressed and hidden consents, agreements and contracts in everyday life. From an analysis of the context, the materiality, the narrations behind the chosen examples each student will develop an artistic strategy / a work.

How can we create knowledge, create meaning or change meaning by using existing material? How is our behavior shaped by visible or invisible agreements? How do algorithms and automated processing influence our decision making?

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Within the framework of the CDSLab the course offers space and time to develop, test, translate and present artistic strategies in close connection with the CDC annual project.

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“I might have sent something to you from my phone. See it spreading. See it become invaded by other sequences, many sequences, see it being re-montaged, rearticulated, reedited. Let’s merge and rip apart our scenarios of occupation. Break continuity. Juxtapose. Edit in parallel. Jump the axe. Build suspense. Pause. Countershoot. Keep chasing spring.

These are our territories of occupation, forcefully kept apart from each other, each in his and her own corporate enclosure. Let’s reedit them. Rebuild. Rearrange. Wreck. Articulate. Alienate. Unfreeze. Accelerate. Inhabit. Occupy.”

(Hito Steyerl, in “Art as an Occupation: Claims for an Autonomy of Life”, The Wretched of the Screen, SternbergPress, 2012. P.118)

• Contribution to the discussion through continuous presentation of the work in progress!
• No absence without prior excuse!
• Presentation of the final results!
• Examinations for the course " The Facts of Life: You, the Art World and the Agreement " for CDS students will be held as part of the finals of the CDCLab. Topic, problem definition and approach will be developed within the course " The Facts of Life: You, the Art World and the Agreement" and must be independently visible in the presentation.