Jonas Lund: Operation Earnest Voice, Brexit Division at The Photographers' Gallery London

Operation Earnest Voice: Brexit Division is a project by artist Jonas Lund commissioned by The Photographers' Gallery London. Over 4 days in January 2019, the artist transformed the 3rd Floor of the Gallery into an influencing office tasked with reversing Brexit, which took over a floor of the Gallery from 10th – 13th of January 2019.

Part installation, part performance, part working think tank, Operation Earnest Voice aimed to explore and interrogate the numerous tools, methods and strategies used to influence public opinion online, from the generation of fake followers to the fabrication of images.

Following an open online recruitment call, twelve appointed staff members from the general public alongside guest experts used their skills to collaboratively create a campaign using tactics that manipulate public opinion, and creating new narratives to disrupt the current political debate. The office was be staffed between 10 – 6pm each day and open to the public. On offer was a daily programme of events, strategy meetings and workshops critically reflecting on and subverting the strategies used by both the ‘Leave’ and ‘Remain’ campaigns as a way of exposing the machinations regularly deployed to sway opinion.

The installation/performance took its name and inspiration from Operation Earnest Voice, the US-sponsored ops campaign, whose purpose is to spread pro-American propaganda on social networking sites. The campaign relies on sockpuppets to comment and derail online conversations, with the goal of influencing and swaying the public opinion in any particular topic or theme. China has a similar operation called The 50th Party and Russia’s is called The Internet Research Agency. Operation Earnest Voice’s office uses similar tools and strategies to influence and sway the public.