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The exhibition Assemblies, Swarms, and Intricate Webs – no solidarity exists in a social void appropriates the categories described by Felix Stalder in his extended essay Digital Solidarity (2013, Mute/PML Books). The exhibition bridges contemporary notions concerning fragile interdependence, networked connectivity, and multiple facets of solidarity with what Stalder writes, apart from the commons: »[…] there are: assemblies, non-hierarchical, usually physical gatherings focused on consensus-based decision making; swarms, ad hoc, self steering collective actors; and weak networks, groups constituted by extensive, yet casual and limited social interaction.« Stalder understands assemblies as the social core – social exemplifiers – existing outside institutional structures, swarms as the prevalent dynamics most significant to communities across digital and trans-localized terrains, and weak networks as the tools employed to host such exchanges. Given the specific contexts spanning the exhibition, intricacy is used here to revisit Stadler’s portrayal of weak networks. These intricacies are what define the interconnecting aspects, weblike structures, and multi-layered undertakings arising from the intrinsic, reflective, and critically aligned endeavors or impulses presented throughout this exhibition as intricate webs.
