Until May 10, you can tune in to catch lists, descriptions and scores remixed and mashed-up by the movements in front of Constant’s office. The setup for footfall analysis installed in the window is not meant to manage crowds nor to predict store profits. It limits itself to poetic readings of the flow of passersby’s devices on Fortstraat. Changing intensities reflect distancing rhythms or curious concentrations. The recordings were made as part of Rhytmic Contingency, an artistic research into the relationship between preemption, prehension, and prediction at work on Muntplein, 1000 Brussels.

Footfall Almanac 2020 collects observations, objects and other traces to instigate a discussion on surveillance techniques currently deployed in shopping malls, at Winterpret and other major events in Brussels. Wireless tracking of mobile phones has become a common method to monitor crowds without requiring explicit permission or active cooperation. Private companies as well as civil agencies use it to keep a close eye on the movements of city dwellers through public spaces, the former to forecast sales and the latter for crowd management purposes. Footfall Almanac 2020 observes this encounter of actors and predictions in their shared technologies and terminologies.

This vitrine and publication are part of an ongoing research project developed by Alex Zakkas and Kurt Tichy.

The publication Footfall Almanac 2019 contains visual and textual essays, including the contributions of co-researchers Femke Snelting and Dennis Pohl. It lists the overlapping vocabularies to address the flight paths of pigeons on the square as well as movements in the underground parking lot. You can download the book or order a printed copy.