Abstract typographic elements slide together to create new characters. In some compositions, a single character is featured. In others, characters string together to form words and sentences, which the algorithm shapes into often-familiar layouts.

The type designer Gerard Unger said “it is almost impossible to look and read at the same time”. Asemica invites you to look without the burden of legibility.

Created by Emily Edelman, Dima Ofman, and Andrew Badr. Command-S to download a vector file. Live token best viewed in Chrome.

Asemica

Screens have been at the heart of art mass production and mass consumption for ages. From screen printing techniques, first developed in China around 1000AD and later popularized in western art culture by e.g. Andy Warhol, to the screens on our devices used to consume both digital art as well as most traditional art we experience in our life.

The "Screens" series is a celebration of modern art. It is inspired by the aesthetics inherent in screen printing along with the compositions and colors of both Bauhaus, Constructivism, and pulp fiction sci-fi covers.

The compositions in "Screens" is based purely on strict geometries and plays with the tension, and symphonies that can be created from combining simple rules. The end result can range from chaotic non-figurative to strongly ordered isometric scenes.

The generative system underlying the rendering mimics the screen printing process by rendering and applying a single color at a time to a master image. Each virtual screen may be more or less aligned with the master, creating a lovely flawed balance to the precision of the rendered geometry.

25% of the proceeds from this project will be donated to Den Blå Planet, The Danish National Aquarium, in support of their work on preserving and restoring marine life and ecology.

Screens

“Fragments of an infinite field” is a compositional system in which an idealized plant species is generated and arranged in a potentially infinite field of foliage. The main environmental parameter of the composition is the determination of a season of the year. The season determines the landscape’s colors and defines specific phenomena for each of them, such as rain in summer, snow in winter, petals falling in autumn, and pollen in spring. The flower has several possible variables, which can be macro aspects, affecting the entire population of the species, or micro, affecting each individual of the species differently. For example, the number of petals can be equal in all individuals or not. The number of filaments and other structures of the flower can undergo minor deviations, generating small mutations. The confusion between the figure (plant) and the background (earth, sky, other natural elements) is fascinating from a compositional point of view. The background colors are, most of the time, colors present in the figures, often breaking the boundary between them and, therefore, generating chromatic masses. In this project I also intend to research the following question: How to create parameters that resemble a living organism's growth? In this sense, the project approaches digital morphogenesis and the development of procedural organisms.

Fragments of an Infinite Field

*The mind moves at the speed of dreams.
Hold on! Hold on! Hold on!
I like to think of my brain as a hand,
palm of my soul, fragile nerve bundle.
I think about my brain as I hold my heart
in both hands — a private thing, a pulsing secret.
It fills my palms and bones with heat.
The world is full of heartbeat.
I am trying to hold it all together...*
    &nbsp; -- &nbsp;Excerpt from *STILL MOVING*, by Technelegy

**NOTE: To fully experience *STILL MOVING*, please open in LIVE VIEW and enable your webcam for motion tracking.**

The first project of its kind, *STILL MOVING* is an interactive poem about humanity’s visceral engagement with the virtual – written and published via the blockchain as a token word performance, and embodied by each collector as a uniquely intimate, personalized interpretation. In this epic on-chain ode to the relationship of bodies and machines, literal and figurative wordplay activates the liminal space between text and reader, extending the two-dimensional screen/page into a somatic, material realm where language moves us in every sense of that phrase – up, down, sideways, forwards, backwards, and in otherwise inexpressible directions – urging us to reclaim our dynamism and intuitive physicality in an age of technological acceleration, bodily inertia, and rote gestures.

A collaboration between Nathaniel Stern and Sasha Stiles – rooted in Stiles’ AI-powered verse and Stern’s career in digital, interactive, and networked art – *STILL MOVING* is an ars poetica about what it means to be a human body facing a machine: a showdown, a form of worship, a distraction, a mirror gaze, an other, an alter, an alter. After we bend to our technologies, do we spring back into shape, or assume new forms? Where does input end, and output begin? As we continue to think, work, and play faster than ever while rooted in place, it is still possible to be moved – *really* moved?

*STILL MOVING* also embodies the future of web3 literature, in which the book – read-only – evolves into a read-write-interact experience, and authors begin to adopt such tools as webcams and NFTs in their writerly arsenal. In each unique edition of *STILL MOVING*, camera-based motion tracking (data confined to your local machine only) facilitates a play-full and meaning-full interface between the reader’s physical self and language on screen. Human forms and gestures shape machine expression, and vice versa, cybernetic serendipity inspires poetic association. Make a move, and be moved… Stand still, and instill meaning…

Palettes pair paper, charcoal, and pencil colorings – emblematic of the stationery/stationary – with neon and electric highlights that nod to computational restlessness. Preview images feature lines from the core poem, potent standalone phrases, or rare, gestural graphics and images, caught somewhere between language and illustration, expression and wordless apprehension. 


**FUNCTIONS**

*Click inside the interaction area if any of the function keys below are not working.*

*Space Bar* to toggle Play/Pause the interaction and animation

*'d'* Downloads the current image at the screen/browser resolution

*Up/Down arrows* increase/decrease camera sensitivity by 5
(for use in high and low light situations;
0-150, default is 90; higher numbers = more text)

*Top two keyboard rows (numbers 1 thru 0 and letters q thru p)* also birth semi-mapped text

*'c'* toggles Camera use (if present and on) between keyboard only or both

*'v'* Views/hides the Verse (your poetry / your iteration’s text)

*'f'* toggles Full screen (Live View only)

*'s'* downloads / Saves the entire AI poem to the hard drive

Still Moving

When I started using a computer, I believed that digital data could be stored forever. I saved my favorite picture files and small free software files to floppy disks with a capacity of roughly 1 megabyte and stored them carefully. Those floppy disks were my treasure. Later, when the disks deteriorated and became unreadable or were lost, the data became memories with a deep feeling of loss.

Blockchains have arisen. Are these truly persistent?

After all, digital data are also a type of memories. They are stored in a person's mind, deteriorate, and one day will be lost with that person.

I find the fragility and beauty in them.
　





　
In this work, I attempted to represent a fictional collapsed blockchain world with visuals and sound.
　
The chain has already been abandoned, and the few nodes that remain barely alive are just maintaining their appearances. Visualizing the remnants of blocks that no longer serve their original purpose, they form something like a submerged city. Then, a large amount of data that has lost its connection to the blocks and has deteriorated to the point that it can no longer be opened, flutters through the sky. The countless remnants of data form a cloud, which undulates like a wave. The details of the data cannot be confirmed, however, they can be seen as glittering lights. As I try to recall the contents of the data that can no longer be opened, I am filled with vague memories and a sense of nostalgia.

This work started with generating sound by code. The sound of rippling waves can be heard by clicking on the screen. Since it would be impractical to store huge sound data on the blockchain, the sound was formed from white noise. In order to reproduce the sound of rippling waves, it was necessary to deepen my understanding of the structure of the sound by referring to academic papers. Then the sound was completed, and the visual imagination expanded from there.

I like to visit the sea near my home and in other places. Different seascapes can be seen from different locations and angles. When I am there, idly gazing at the seascape and listening to the sound of the waves, I sometimes feel as if I am the only human there and the world has gone to ruin. If the world were ruined, this seascape and the sound of the waves would remain for a long time. This feeling and the fragility felt in digital data are the basis of this work. I imagine that the heaven or the graveyard where the lost data flies up in the sky and arrives may be a seascape like this.

The reason why I used data as lights and clouds drifting in the sky and moved them like waves is because I wanted to depict unrealistic behavior with a realistic subject matter and to express a beautiful and bizarre world in which these intertwine.

For the visual expression technique, I further pursued and evolved the drawing system that I have developed in "GHOST IN THE CODE" and my other works. Everything is composed of rectangles, indicating that this world is beginning to become low-resolution. Depth is linked to the size of the rectangles, and distant objects are represented by small rectangles as if they were in focus. Dispersion in the position and color of the rectangles indicate the degree of deterioration of the world. Moreover, the sky, blocks, and the surface of the water are identified and each has its own characteristics.

Algorithms generate various compositions, colors, and other features. I have attempted to make each output feel nostalgic and fresh at the same time. The blocks, which have lost their original meaning, are contrasted with the data, which exists in isolation from them, in stillness and movement. Occasional red clouds or blocks mean that they are corrected as red, the first color, due to missing information.

Through these integrations, I have attempted to create a work that can be stored on a blockchain, and that is both visually and sonically interactive.

[NOTE]

-To save the image press the 'S' key.
-To change the flow velocity press the '↑' or '↓' key.

Modern hardware and browser hardware acceleration is recommended. The Chrome browser on a desktop with a high-end GPU is optimal. On iOS, the best experience is available on iOS 15 or later.

Art Blocks Curated

Memories of Digital Data #208

Kazuhiro Tanimoto

More in Art Blocks Curated

Asemica

Emily Edelman - Dima Ofman - Andrew Badr

Screens

Thomas Lin Pedersen

Fragments of an Infinite Field

Monica Rizzolli

Still Moving

Nathaniel Stern and Sasha Stiles

Art

Company

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