HyperHash explores the possibilities of representing abstract data on Ethereum as intuitive color and geometry spaces. Focus of research are topics like geometry & symbolism. The artworks generate a futuristic, telepathic & symbolic language for Etherians. All artworks have unique colors, geometry and motion signatures live generated on your gpu through shader (GLSL) code.


HyperHash

Inside the computer there’s a digital hand. The hand selects a metal implement, cuts off a slab of clay, and carves into its surface. It wanders like your hand wanders; it carves imaginary contours, sinuous and exploratory. It doesn’t know the end result so it carves lines until it feels content, and then it numbers the piece and stamps its maker’s mark. It fires the slab in a digital kiln (it calls this “minting”) and through this act its art is preserved for millennia. The hand runs its fingers over the textured surface, feeling satisfaction at having spontaneously produced a piece of art so beautiful, expressive, and unique.

---
 
Ceramics is a generative sculpture that mimics the physical expression of carving into clay. Through uncanny naturalistic rendering it challenges our notion of “handmade”. It asserts that the value of handmade isn’t the time it takes to make the work nor the physical materials consumed, but the endless small decisions and serendipitous details that appear along the way, as can be felt in each Ceramics mint.

Despite the handmade nature of Ceramics the outputs cannot be touched. Highly tactile images enchant the viewer to imagine their tangible representations, and leave them to dwell on their perception of materiality — both in the experiential physical world and conceptually-infinite digital space.

Ceramics

The contemporary moment is defined by the appearance of artificial systems that mimic intelligent behaviours with uncanny skill: bots that you can converse with, machines that can act as pets, and even the algorithms that recommend ads to you. At times they appear as strange beings; alive. To make sense of this phenomenon, we are forced to reconsider our notion of the living state beyond what we are familiar with on Earth. 

Calian is an infinitely zoomable and scrollable exploration of lifelike behaviour. It exhibits ambiguous natural-digital forms in a dynamic rendering. Species grow and compete; they get carried by the elements; they face boom, bust, and echo. 

What makes something alive? To go beyond recognition of terrestrial biology we need to delineate general principles and apply them to new intelligent systems. Calian uses the fruits of my research into the origin of life to create persistent, complex systems that we can experience and study (*). We can identify properties of living matter but these fall short of a satisfactory and succinct criterion. When does agency begin? Or identity? Calian asks you to ponder this as you wander through its ecosystems. 

Feel free to explore but be careful: although life is pervasive, living things are delicate. Your interactions affect the ecosystem, obliquely. 

Calian continues a thread of my work probing deep scientific questions with artistic means. It furthermore connects to my previous Artblocks projects Mazinaw and Glass through the theme of ambiguity: while Mazinaw suggested the hand of an unknown creator, and Glass visualized the intrinsic ambiguity of our quantum mechanical universe, Calian's amorphous forms bear characteristics both of familiar organic matter and digital technology. 

Interactive features allow you to explore each ecosystem, infinitely, both in depth and in scope. As you wander, the shader repopulates the world from its initial condition, while the physical laws governing the dynamics themselves evolve.

See Display Notes for Controls.

(*) For more on Calian's dynamics and its grounding in my research, see the Calian page on my website.

Calian

Click to activate sound 🔈 The work is responsive, it will adapt to any screen size 🌹

👉 Legowelt: *For Polychrome Music I designed a generative music system that plays an infinite composition on 3 different audio channels, each with their own synthesizer. These randomly generate simple musical timbres inspired by early computer sound chips. 🌴 The music itself is generated by randomly selecting 3 patterns out of a pool of 180. These patterns, which are little 8-bar music pieces, were written in the same C# Dorian scale so they always fit together. This is a pleasant sounding minor and colorful scale that I believe fits the general vibe of Rafaël’s work. 🌲 Composition wise, channel 1 plays the bassline and channels 2 and 3 the melody, countermelody, arpeggios and harmonies. 🌳 The system changes the patterns each time they are played, reversing, speeding up or slowing down the pattern or changing the synthesizer channel they are played on. In essence the system infinitely randomly remixes the source melodies to create ever new surprising pieces that harmonize with the colorful compositions.* 👈

Polychrome Music

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 #426

Kazuhiro Tanimoto

More in Art Blocks Curated

HyperHash

Beervangeer

Ceramics

Charlotte Dann

Calian

Eric De Giuli

Polychrome Music

Rafaël Rozendaal & Danny Wolfers (Legowelt)

Art

Company

Learn