Street Talk is the record of a project by conceptual artist Stephen Willats in which he filmed (unbeknownst to them) passers-by walking down two streets in Amsterdam.

This manual, which includes texts, interviews and artwork from five decades of practice, is intended as a tool for any artist or practitioner looking to find a meaningful relationship with contemporary society.

Since the 1960s, Stephen Willats is counted as one of the most influential protagonists of international conceptual art in England.

This is the first re-issue of Stephen Willats’ major text The Artist as an Instigator of Changes in Social Cognition and Behaviour since its original publication in 1973.

For the first time, this publication brings together the Mosaic works by the British artist Stephen Willats, which were created in Great Britain and Finland in the 1990s. In these works, Willats uses the medium of the book to enter into an exchange with people and to create a space in neighborhoods, museums, and bookstores where social bonds can be established. It is a collaborative process through which Willats redefines the web of relationships between artist, artwork, audience and society; a process of instituting in which the artwork becomes its own institution.

With contributions by Jamie Allen, Bernhard Garnicnig, Elsa Himmer, Lucie Kolb and Stephen Willats.