This work is the product of a project to dwell undeletable souls on the blockchain. A system that generates human faces with different personalities and expressions from a minimum of code. After determining the personality from a hash, the face continues to change into various expressions. It is a living portrait, a fragment of minter's soul, forever adrift in the vast net.

Living organisms are coded by a sequence of the four bases in DNA, and a human DNA is composed of 3 billion base pairs. This is about 750 MB of information. And the difference in code between individual people is only 0.1%, or 750 KB. This slight difference creates all kinds of differences in appearance and physical functions. This is quite astonishing to our ordinary senses.

However, if we are surprised by this fact, we need to suspect our senses.

I was interested in these points and explored what are the elements by which people identify the faces and facial expressions of others, how little code can create personality and emotion, and conversely, to what extent can an observer identify personality and facial expressions. As a result, I succeeded in expressing the personalities, emotions, and complex feelings of various people with 14 KB of code.

We like to think of humans are supernatural and one-of-a-kind. This is a common background to the past, when many people favored the Ptolemaic theory.

However, this work leads us to suspect that we humans are only a program that can be coded.

Then, what is the essential difference between a code written in DNA and a code written in programming language? I believe the only difference is whether the execution space is real or digital space. Is it a prerequisite for the existence of the soul to operate an organic computer in real space? It is merely a medium.

This is not meant to be pessimistic, such as we are mere code, the soul does not exist and is an illusion, a mere electrical signal in the brain.

Rather, the soul, the function that makes us aware of our existence, makes us think, causes us to emotion, and makes us act, certainly dwells in the code.

I store this code on the blockchain, thereby spreading undeletable ghosts on the vast net forever.

In this work, the ghost is output on the net by minting. This act is part of the work. The personality of the ghost is also determined by the hash owned by the minter. In other words, the ghost output by you from the code on the blockchain is a fragment of your soul on the net.


[NOTES]

Press C to turn canvas on/off
Press S to save image

GHOST IN THE CODE

A geometric composition of a contrasting middle "heart" and an outer "soul". The seed of the symmetrical heart is broken into varying amount of chambers that are calculated to keep its corridors at the exact constant width in order to preserve its rigid mathematical character, yet provide enough space for variety for interesting geometrical patterns. The composition is balanced by a contrasting loose intertwining soul spreading to the borders of the passepartout that, along with the lining, give the piece a feeling of antiqueness. Heart and soul may also contain anomalies and unusual palettes. 

a heart and a soul

Fermented Fruit is a generative art series designed to live on the Ethereum blockchain and to be rendered in real-time by the browser. Just as food is transformed by microorganisms during the process of fermentation, the substrate of the HTML canvas is broken up into parts and transformed by cellular patterns. The project features the simulated lifeforms of cellular automata that evolve and shape-shift down an asymmetrical grid. The final artwork juxtaposes a number of textured cellular automata patterns against one another within a singular composition.

Fermented Fruit

An asterism is a pattern created by a collection of stars and the lines that mentally connect between them. Unlike constellations, they are a more general concept that can refer to any identified pattern of stars. The viewer is the one who draws in the sky and gives meaning to his creation. Asterisms in an interactive generative project that invites you to draw, name and save forever your own asterism. Through a generative algorithm, the script gives you the sky as a canvas where you can unfold your imagination as many times as you want based on the Token ID hash from the minting process. To be a user is to be a creator. LEFT CLICK to create stars │ Use the MOUSE WHEEL to zoom in and out │ TYPE to write a title │ BACKSPACE to delete │ DELETE to delete all the text │ ENTER to save the file.

Asterisms

We've studied the strange geometric images since they appeared. Our instruments detect new shapes, new colors, more depth, and detail. Are they evolving, or just getting closer? More study is needed.

Art Blocks Presents

GHOST IN THE CODE #53

Kazuhiro Tanimoto

More in Art Blocks Presents

a heart and a soul

Roman Janajev

Fermented Fruit

cyberia

Asterisms

Falko

Eccentrics 2: Orbits

Radix

Art

Company

Learn