IT

Displayed at Palazzo Diedo, the exhibition “Strange Rules” – curated by Mat Dryhurst, Holly Herndon and Hans Ulrich Obrist, in collaboration with Adriana Rispoli – explores the underlying yet crucial rules that set the production, distribution and perception of culture in the digital age, introducing the concept of Protocol Art. 

Algorithms, artificial intelligence models, protocols, IT platforms and technological infrastructures have become indispensable elements and invisible architectures of contemporary culture. Building on this very timely premise, the exhibition Strange Rules, on display in Venice at Palazzo Diedo until 22 November 2026, does not merely aim to describe the ways and forms in which these tools are employed in the process of creating a work of art, but rather seeks to present these processes as artistic material. 
Developing this theoretical premise, Strange Rules takes the form of an ambitious exhibition project, aimed at introducing the concept of Protocol Art, in an attempt to outline the possibilities offered by the spillover of these “protocols” of the digital age into the field of art and by their hybridisation. 

THE STRANGE RULES EXHIBITION IN VENICE

The exhibition itinerary is emblematically opened by the environmental installation Attention Guild (2026) by Mat Dryhust and Holly Herndon, in collaboration with SUB, in which, for the duration of the exhibition, a software is constantly translated into musical language, immediately preparing the viewer to engage with the protocols and codes of the contemporary digital and technological world. Continuing along the same lines, an initial selection of works and installations explores the multiple fields of application of the protocols at the heart of the exhibition, ranging from biology and ecology to pop culture and the procedural generation of images. 

The works on display on the first floor further explore the ideas and themes of Protocol Art through a series of videos, paintings, site-specific installations and the remarkable permanent commission The Diambulist Humself (2026) by Philippe Parreno, a complex mobile sculpture whose behaviour is not pre-programmed, but determined by sensors that, by reading the internal and external environment, translate physical data into movement and light, not unlike a living organism inserted into the Venetian context. Finally, on the second floor, a video room presents works that explore other aspects of the relationship between technology, life and art. Overall, the exhibition is not structured as a rigidly constructed itinerary designed to promote a single interpretation of the concept of Protocol Art, but rather as a testing ground where the manifold possibilities of these “protocols” unfold in parallel, and where the formal or conceptual differences between the artworks do not detract from the exhibition’s sense of unity, which stems from the essentially coherent atmosphere that pervades it.

THE CONCEPT OF PROTOCOL ART

The central theme of the exhibition is, in fact, the very concept of Protocol Art, of which the works on display are possible manifestations. Although the shift in focus from the art object as such to the productive and cultural processes surrounding it is a line of thought that has already been historically developed, the innovative scope of the idea of Protocol Art lies in the exquisitely contemporary nature of the works, which can exist only because of the possibilities offered by current technological development and, in particular, thanks to the use of forms of artificial intelligence whose application is accepted as an established practice and reality. Protocol Art thus presents itself as an organic and coherent development in the relationship between art, technology and digital culture in the contemporary world, highlighting the processes that could increasingly shape the cultural discourse. 

PROTOCOL ART AND CURATION

If, in 1993, a young Hans Ulrich Obrist launched the do it project by gathering instructions from some of the greatest artists of the time on how to create works of art – aware that these would not easily become such – more than thirty years on, Strange Rules showcases those processes which, thanks to technological development, can finally allow simple instructions to become works of art. In this context, the curator assumes a fundamental mediating role between the diverse fields affected by Protocol Art, identifying its aesthetic potential and exploring its various manifestations. At the same time, the role of the curator proves central to the critical interpretation of the transformations in contemporary culture and to the attempt to assess the multiple perspectives opened up by technological evolution, seeking to bring to light the “strange rules” that characterise it. 

Elia Castello

The exhibition Strange Rules at Palazzo Diedo in Venice

The text has been translated in English using AI