Characterized by Dance: Inside Art Blocks’ latest immersive digital art collection

Wednesday prominent generative digital art collective Art blocks will debut its latest curated series, “Human unreadable”— a three-act conceptual choreography work that involves both artwork on the chain and physical experiences.

The project, courtesy of Ania Catherine and Dejha Ti – the Berlin-based art duo known as Operator— will consist of 400 Ethereum NFT artworks created by dance.

While that description may sound flowery, it happens to be quite literally true in this case: Catherine and Ti have developed a coding language in which sequences of human movements are translated into what they call choreographic hashes—code that determines the appearance of a piece of digital art.

A “humanly unreadable” piece. Image: Operator

Just like other Art Blocks projects are automatically generated by embossing a set of coded parameters, “Human unreadable” will be generated by automated combinations of dance movements that will give birth to hundreds of unique works of art.

The series, which will be sold via Dutch auction at Art Blocks on Wednesday afternoon, does not mark the first foray into blockchain by Catherine and Ti. The two artists, who are married, previously released “Let me check with the wife,” an NFT-based marriage certificate that played with the concept of utility by contractually requiring holders to do (or give) something to the artists each year on their wedding anniversary.

“Human unreadable,” but appears to represent a new union of the duo’s respective concentrations. Catherine is a choreographer and performance artist; Ti is a technologist and immersive artist focused on the relationship between humans and computers.

Image: Operator

With “Unreadable” the duo aims to explore, according to Catherine, the tension between privacy and transparency represented by the blockchain, and the way the human touch can often be hidden in digital environments.

To that end, while the project’s first act – the 400 digital artworks – may initially appear to consist of fairly standard two-dimensional still images, these NFTs will soon after evolve to reveal the humanity beneath.

In late June, “Human unreadable” holders will be able to unlock secondary NFTs, soul-bound to their originals, which reveal the exact sequence of dance moves used to shape and create the original artwork.

For the project’s grand finale, Catherine and Ti will then produce an immersive dance performance at an as-yet-unnamed cultural institution, consisting of the exact choreography that underpins the first 100″Human unreadable” NFTs are embossed. Everyone holders will be invited to attend the event.

Catherine coordinates a rehearsal of dances based on the “Human Unreadable” choreography hashes. Courtesy: Operator

However, even holders whose NFTs are not depicted during that performance may equally act out their secondary choreographic NFTs on their own, to bring their pieces to life.

“Collectors don’t just want the artwork or the printed score that moves the score on the wall,” Ti shared Decrypt. “[Any] collector could give [the sequences] to a dancer or a choreographer and have it performed themselves… they really want to own this piece of choreography.”

The evolution is traced by “Humanly unreadable,” can then – from the purely digital, to the synergy between human movement and digital production, all the way to the immersive and physically accessible – be considered the core of Catherine and Ti’s view of blockchain-based art. But despite Web3 natives The nature of the thesis does not consider Catherine and Ti themselves as Web3 artists.

“We have no allegiance to any particular technology,” Ti told us Decrypt. “The fidelity is to the concept of the work itself. In this case, it had to be blockchain technology, not only as a distribution method, but also as part of the medium for the work.”

Despite their technological agnosticism, Ti and Catherine have long shared an affinity for crypto-art. In 2018, the duo began presenting their projects at crypto events, despite the fact that these works had nothing to do with the blockchain. Something about the burgeoning, rebellious and frenetic crypto art scene melded with Catherine and Ti’s artistic experimentation, and the duo was welcomed with open arms.

“The crypto art world was all outsiders,” Catherine shared Decrypt. “And what we did, we were outsiders.”

“That spirit is still there,” Ti added. “Obviously it’s watered down now. But a core community still exists.”