Deniz Tortum, Computer at night, 2017, Video installation

Video stills from Computer at night

A computer at night checks its record against the record of thousands of other computers. A computer at night manages human interactions through algorithmic transactions. A computer at night negates trust.

A new type of decentralized government is dreaming itself into existence, offering immutable contracts as the remedy to gluts of human misinformation. The programmers and believers saw emancipation in ledgers, automation, and a ‘trustless’ network that requires no single powerful actor to back its currency. But all utopias have mirror cities within them.

Computer at night is a rumination on the people, practices and the blockchain technology that set this trustless system in motion.