Programs stored on a blockchain that run automatically when their conditions are met. They handle minting, sales, royalties and generative algorithms for NFT art.
Because we saw a lot of this happening a few years ago on Ethereum, artists that weren't just taking their PNGs and affixing them to a non-fungible token, but instead thinking about ways to use the smart contracts and the transaction methodology and the protocols as a way of expressing the work in itself.
Regina Harsanyi, Frieze Week New York: Rhizome, MoMI, Karyn Nakamura
When someone feeds cryptocurrency into this smart contract, the plant activates itself and then it has its own interaction.
Primavera De Filippi, Strange Rules: Protocol Art at the Venice Biennale