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The Protocolist Framework

The idea becomes a machine that makes the art. — Sol LeWitt[1]

Preamble

This document codifies the principles of a distinct artistic modality: Protocolist Art. It is a
framework for producing aesthetic objects through the design, execution, and documentation of a
governed procedure. This is not a speculative theory but a manual of a functioning methodology
native to an era of mixed human-machine cognition.

The Protocol as Aesthetic Object

The central tenet of Protocolist Art is that the formal, articulated, and version-locked set of
constraints is the primary aesthetic object. The elegance, rigor, and internal consistency of the
procedure are valued more highly than the surface aesthetics of any single output. The artwork is
the design of the system—the documented rules, the software stack, the operational grammar.

The practice, therefore, has more in common with disciplined choreography, constitutional law, or
the design of a formal game than with expressive painting.[2] The protocol is judged on its
conceptual clarity, its capacity for generating novelty, and the integrity of its structure.[3]

The Curator-Operator & The Medium

Within the protocol, ultimate artistic agency is vested in the human curator-operator. This
figure is not a traditional maker but a sovereign editor and system architect whose authorship is
expressed through high-level strategic decisions.[4] This sovereignty is exercised through three
key functions:

  • High-Level Selection: The choice of subject, dataset, or initial Spark that initiates a
    generative act.
  • Mid-Loop Steering: The iterative process of providing feedback and correcting course to guide
    the generative engine.
  • Final Cut: The ultimate editorial authority to select, reject, and structure the raw output
    into a finished artifact.

The medium is a semi-autonomous generative engine (typically a large language model). It is
regarded not as a collaborator, but as a volatile, pattern-laden substrate—a responsive material
with its own unique properties.[5] The artist's skill lies in mastering this material: learning its
texture, predicting its response to certain tools (prompts), navigating its areas of resistance, and
harnessing its capacity for serendipitous, non-human patterns.

The Artifact as a Verifiable Trace

An artifact of Protocolist Art is not a unique, unrepeatable performance; it is a reproducible
edition.[6] Every artifact must also be a networked trace, its meaning inseparable from its
context within a larger, non-hierarchical network of inquiry.[7] This is achieved through a strict
mandate for traceability and reproducibility, guaranteed by:

  • Rhizomatic Linkage: Each artifact must store and display inbound and outbound links, creating
    a traceable, non-linear web of inquiry.
  • Version Locking: The core components of the generative stack, including the model version and
    core prompts, must be versioned to ensure that, in theory, another operator could replay the
    process.[8]

This principle moves the practice away from the romantic notion of a singular masterpiece and toward
the rigorous, verifiable tradition of printmaking or industrial design.

The Ethical Commitments

The use of opaque, large-scale generative engines requires a formal, visible commitment to ethical
operation. The protocol must include two key commitments:

  • The Bias-Audit Loop: The operator must document attempts to probe the engine for biased
    outputs and log the steps taken to mitigate them. This makes the ethical labor of curation a
    visible and integral part of the final work.[9]
  • A Fork-Friendly License: A protocol gains value through adoption and critique. Therefore, the
    core protocol must be published under a license (e.g., Creative Commons BY-SA) that explicitly
    invites others to branch, modify, and run new experiments with it.[10] The artwork is an open,
    extensible system designed for proliferation.

Conclusion

Protocolist Art synthesizes and extends threads from Process Art, Systems Art, and Conceptual Art,
updating them for an era of algorithmic synthesis.[11] It makes its primary argument through the
structure of its protocol, engaging in a form of procedural rhetoric.[12] By making the design,
execution, and documentation of a governed procedure the artwork itself, it transforms the
challenges of our informational era—the blurring of human-machine authorship, the nature of
creativity in the age of AI, and the need for reproducible digital artifacts—into its explicit
subject and medium.

Annotated Appendix

↗ https://www.artforum.com/features/paragraphs-on-conceptual-art-211354/ — contextual Artforum
record;
↗ https://www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/learn/schools/teachers-guides/wall-drawing-831 — museum usage
confirming wording.
Epistemic Note: Establishes the lineage for protocol-as-art.

↗ https://www.britannica.com/art/musical-notation\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): A score is a protocol for producing a performance; notation
demonstrates centuries of proceduralization.

↗ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aesthetic-experience/\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Parallels the valuation of procedures for clarity and elegance;
“protocol as primary aesthetic” mirrors taste for elegant proofs.

↗ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_chess\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Model for Curator-Operator sovereignty: human sets strategy;
machine explores tactics.

↗ https://www.britannica.com/technology/Linotype\
Epistemic Note (Adversarial): Operator-as-expert of a volatile machine; analogous to LLM
operator practice.

David L. Donoho, “An Invitation to Reproducible Computational Research,” Biostatistics
11(3), 2010.
↗ https://www.bitss.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/an-invitation-to-reproducible-computational-research1.pdf\
Epistemic Note (Primary): Imports scientific reproducibility norms into editioned art practice.

Deleuze & Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus, Univ. of Minnesota Press (1987 English trans.).
↗ https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816614028/a-thousand-plateaus/\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Foundation for “networked trace” and rhizomatic linkage.

Scott Chacon & Ben Straub, Pro Git, official online edition.
↗ https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2\
Epistemic Note (Primary): Hashing/branching/versioning as the technical substrate of replayable
protocols.

Robyn Caplan, Joan Donovan, Lauren Hanson, Jeanna Matthews, Algorithmic Accountability: A
Primer, Data & Society (2018).
↗ https://datasociety.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Data_Society_Algorithmic_Accountability_Primer_FINAL-4.pdf\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Makes the bias-audit loop an explicit, documented component of the
artwork.

Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA), “Open Source Hardware Definition.”
↗ https://oshwa.org/resources/open-source-hardware-definition/\
Epistemic Note (Primary): Treat the protocol as intellectual hardware; license for proliferation
and critique.

Jack Burnham, “Systems Esthetics,” Artforum (September 1968).
↗ https://www.artforum.com/features/systems-esthetics-201372/\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Evaluates the system—components, relations, feedback—as aesthetic
object.

Ian Bogost, Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames, MIT Press, 2007.
↗ https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262514880/persuasive-games/\
Epistemic Note (Conceptual): Rules and processes make arguments; the protocol’s structure is
the rhetoric.