---

FROM THE TERRITORY OF THE SQUARE METRE TO THE NETWORKS TERRITORY
by FRED FOREST

Begun in the 1980's this project is meant to continue and develop without being interrupted, until the death of the artist. Today the Territory "is moving" into the Networks and becoming the "Territory of Territories", a coherent step in keeping with its character and the statement it makes with respect to the theories of Sociological Art and the Esthetics of Communication.( See passages by Pierre Restany and Annick Bureaud ). This involves the switch from the material to the virtual: the switch to network art !
The concept of the "Territory" at the outset as an "open-ended work", an interactive game of simulation and communication, allows the project to change according to environmental mutations and technological developments. The project is a sequel to the art-and-media events punctuating the life of the "square metre".
The "Territory" is located 50 km to the north-east of Paris, in Anserville in the Oise province in France.
Despite the great move the town remains the historical landmark for all the developments in progress.
The Territory is represented by a piece of land and a building, together constituting an "independent State" answering to its very own rules and laws. The legislation
is set and altered by the artist, who decides what to do taking into account emergencies and novel situations that arise .
The buildings are the seat of "Power" and its different tributaries. The rooms are fitted out in keeping with the functions, symbols and activities characterisic of the artistic undertakings.
The Territorial Administration is backed by the artist-President at the crucial moments of making and implementing decisions. The artist-President combines his multiple roles from the point of view of the imaginary world founded, generated and led to fruition by the system itself.
Once approved by the Territorial Administration one may become a fully-fledged citizen of the Territory
by acquiring a square metre. This leads one to procure several official holdings in the form of documents signed by the artist-President himself. Once the formalities have been concluded, citizens gain automatic admittance to a communicating game doubling as a laboratory of ideas for the Future.
They can choose to position themselves as "passive" players or as "active" participants in the esthetico-parodial strategy of the game. They receive regular information concerning the goings-on on the Territory, information that "nurtures" the developing creations they possess.

With the move into the networks and the switch to the virtual Territory, the notion of the territory in itself is subject to analysis. The foot stepping on land and thus claiming it cannot but be a universal and "planetary" one.
The idea of a frontier dissolves like a cube of sugar in a glass of water... We have to rethink our lifestyle, feelings, thoughts, our ways of sharing with others !
We have to invent the " Networks Territory".

We are here to do just that !