Google Office, 2010

mixed-media installation, Taipei Biennial 2010, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, curated by Tirdad Zolghadr and Hongjohn Lin

Google Office is a satire on the contemporary workplace that focuses on the collapse of the distinction between work and leisure within post-Fordist economies, highlighting the proliferation of the new identity of the entrepreneur and the commodification of both knowledge and social relations. The installation contains five separate zones and was designed as a functional space to host talks and seminars during the Taipei Biennial 2010. Also equipped with games and free Wi-Fi, Google Office was frequently occupied by people genuinely playing or working, seemingly unaware that they had become performers in the piece.

Use of Google Office was subject to a contract (written in Chinese and English) – parodying the intellectual property release agreements that today seem to pervade every possible site of knowledge production, from social media platforms to universities. It states that any intellectual property produced within the Google Office becomes the property of Taipei Fine Arts Museum, and that, by reading the text, users of the space immediately indicate consent to its terms.