Art for Valentine’s: NFT Gift Ideas for Significant Others

Any day is a good day to show your loved ones and friends that you care for them. Expressing it through the medium of art is worth a thousand words, unless it’s through poetry, of course ;) NFTs can travel distances and in our time of post-electronic superhighway, what more convenient format can art take?

I present you with some of the gems found across the web3 rabbit hole, some more experimental than others, that could be a nice present for a special occasion. Enjoy!

“I Love U (and OT)” by Alexander Mordvintsev @zzznah

I Love U (and OT) on Objkt

Self-described as a “Mad Scientist”, Mordvintsev is known for creating DeepDream, a computer vision program that produces works with a dream-like appearance reminiscent of a psychedelic experience in the deliberately overprocessed images. It was quite viral in the early days of AI image processing and iconic for the time.

Mordvintsev’s I Love U (and OT) is made with optimal transport. He also provides a guide to create your own here.

“Love” by Eva Hauschild @eva_hauschild

LOVE on Objkt

Love is a painting made with light and Apple pencil by Swiss Artist Eva Hauschild who works with Analog and Digital tools. This gentle piece makes for a sweet and affordable present.

lifeforms by Sarah Friend @isthisanart_

lifeforms on OpenSea. Mint new here.

If you’re up for the challenge, try an NFT that requires care. These entities created by Sarah Friend are like any living thing that needs regular care in order to thrive. If not properly looked after, lifeforms die. A lifeform that has died will no longer appear in wallets, is not transferable, and cannot be brought back to life in any way. How do you care for a lifeform? Within 90 days of receiving it, you must give it away.

You can gift a Lifeform to your partner and take turns at “custody” - make sure to transfer it to each other no more than within 90 day intervals.

“PEACE FOR UKRAINE” by Stepan Ryabchenko @VirtualStepan

PEACE FOR UKRAINE on Ryabchenko’s website

For those interested in gifting with impact, The “Peace” collection by Ukrainian artist Stepan Ryabchenko is fundraising for his ART LABORATORY Creative Nonprofit Association for the realization of projects to restore and develop the culture of Ukraine.

The first work from Ryabchenko’s “Peace” series was featured in TIME Magazine 2022, the drawing reminds us of the most important thing in such unsettling times – Love.

“Landscape with Carbon Capture” by @zancan

Landscape with Carbon Capture on OpenSea

A gift of a blooming garden by one of the most prominent artists on Tezos, Zancan, is another great idea to flourish the feelings. Zancan is a generative artist from Bordeaux, France and prior to entering the digital art realm, he has been a painter and programmer for four decades. By synergizing his former practice as a traditional artist working with oil paint into the medium of computer code, he explores the graphical possibilities of a ‘figurative-generative’ art genre.

You can browse the affordable collection of Landscape with Carbon Capture. For the gift to be extra special, filter the collection for pink (or black) paper variations.

Not Even Love Will Tear Us Apart by LIA @liasomething

Not Even Love Will Tear Us Apart on sedition

LIA’s work Not Even Love Will Tear Us Apart has in focus the ultimate symbol of love: the heart. The latter is suggested through continuously evolving shapes that rotate, move and mirror each other. All forms appear in pairs and the composition’s perpetual motion suggests the former will be separated. However, each pair ultimately remains connected to a shared point.

LIA: “as with relationships between lovers, permanent change happens in the details while the overall aesthetic remains the same”. New shapes overlay old structures, adding ever-increasing depth to the resulting image, therewith building a history that in turn forms the backdrop for yet new formations.

“Non NFT” by @XCOPYART x @Moxarra x @neurocolor

Non NFT on OpenSea

On the higher end of the budget spectrum, if you want a gift that says something like “till death do us part” but be cool about it - this piece made as a collab by three legendary crypto artists may do the trick! Made especially for the Non NFT conference in Mexico City, it is definitely going to be a memorable item in the wallet.

“I Tolerate You” by Willow Pines @pines_willow

I Tolerate You on versum

Let the one you're with know you tolerate them this Valentine's Day. This vox-stitch done work by Willow Pines gets to the point :)

A GIFT by Julie Marie Wade @manyplums and Rose Jackson @in_cloudlands

A GIFT on Infinite Objects

A GIFT is a poem written by Julie Marie Wade and interpreted by Rose Jackson. A perfect way to express your feelings with gentle words and accompanying art. The artwork is part of the HANDHELD POEMS collection, a limited edition video print series by theVERSEverse and Infinite Objects, in partnership with Studio As We Are.

The poem is offered as a Video Print - a video of the artwork as a loop in a custom digital frame by Infinite Objects.

DoodleDeProgramming by Jun Kiyoshi @junkiyoshi

Jun Kiyoshi has an array of animated shapes and forms in his collection including several variations of hearts in different colors and movements. Kiyoshi is a developer for a packaged software development company in Nagoya, Japan who has been also sharing daily his videos via Twitter and Instagram for over four years now to inspire creativity in others.

“Doodle Cats” by Kristy Glas @KristyGlas

Let's Watch the Sunrise Together on OpenSea

Let’s be honest - it’s hard to miss with cats. If your loved one is into cats and they don’t own a Kristy Glas NFT yet, this collection is perfect for picking a unique piece. meow.

“Rhythm Down Below” by Lorna Mills @lm_netwebs

Rhythm Down Below on Objkt

Gift a GIF this V-Day by the GIF queen herself. Canadian artist Lorna Mills is known for her signature style and has been creating digital art since the early 1990’s. She was part of exhibition the Canadian Embassy in Berlin, for Transmediale, “At Play in the Fields of the Lord” at Transfer Gallery, Brooklyn NY, and Dreamlands at the Whitney Museum in NY. Her work was also displayed the month of March, 2016 on 45 screens in Times Square, NYC, every night as part of the Midnight Moment program curated by Times Square Arts.

Friendly Gifts

“Friendship Bracelets” by Alexis André @MacTuitui

Friendship Bracelets on OpenSea

With a myriad of shapes and colors to choose from, this iconic collection offers a wide selection of NFTs to pick for your dear ones.

Inspired by the late artist Donald Judd, artist and founder of ArtBlocks Erick Calderon (a.k.a. @Snowfro), collaborated with renowned artist Alexis André (a.k.a. MacTuitui) to bring generative art and ephemeral physical objects together in the form of friendship bracelets.

“Friendship Decagons” by @0xDecaArt

Friendship Decagons on Deca.art

For the more knowledgeable collectors, the gift of Decagon is a good one. Made for your family, friends & frens - Friendship Decagons take your relationship to the next level: onchain.

Just like friends irl, friendship Decagons need to grow together. They start humbly, as all Decagons do. But they’re bound to each other. Paired palettes & matching metadata. You can upgrade your Decagons to the next level together and both friends can pledge DXP (can be earned on Deca.art) to upgrade.

“Hugs on Tape” by LoVid @lovidlovid

Sam + Tim on Ryan Lee gallery

Hugs on tape satisfies a visceral need for physical contact in the pandemic era. The artists wanted to distribute hug simulations that can share bursts of joy and intimacy. A call was sent out to friends and family requesting recordings of hugs with someone in their pod. The recordings captured tenderness and love among those spending more time than ever together, and a choreography of closeness inside the familiar frame of video, animation, and zoom calls.

The series is created with tools ranging from handmade audio/video synthesizers to smartphones and digital animation software. All the patterns and colors in hugs on tape are made exclusively with hardware, analog synthesizers and other analog instruments. Although some were found or borrowed, LoVid’s handmade synthesizers are the primary instruments used in LoVid recordings for over a decade.

Collecting Crypto Art and NFTs: Collectors Spotlight

Down in the web3 rabbit hole things move faster than in the real world. During my humble three years in the scene I've witnessed more projects and legendary collections built than over a decade in the ‘traditional’ art market. What makes it so different? To better answer this question I’ve spoken to some of the old-timers (by the market measurements) who have been collecting regardless of the market cycle, with an interest in the long-term success of the artists they support.

Untitled by William Mapan, minted Mar 4, 2021.

I’ve asked for a group collectors to share some of their favourite works, and answer questions that can help guide aspiring collectors when tip-toeing (or cannonballing) into the world of crypto art. This survey may also serve as an insight for artists to better understand the thought-process of devoted patrons when it comes to acquiring new work.

Fanny Lakoubay @Flakoubay

A crypto art collector, advisor and activist since 2018.

Highlights from the collection:

1. Tokenized Cloud Sphere One (YYZ to MCO) by  Martin Lukas Ostachowski @MLOdotArt
This is a 2018 unenhanced, computer-aided photo collage, part of the Tokenized Cloud Sphere installation of 12 cloud spheres, which were created from photo series taken on passenger flights across North America. The photos were stitched into panoramas using software and lightly retouched on the edges to allow smooth connections into a sphere.

2. Attempt 0 by Ania Catherine @aniacatherine and Dejha Ti @dejhati
Attempts is the first lot from Ania Catherine and Dejha Ti’s Privacy Collection. Attempt 0 is one of eleven unique works the series of choreographic attempts to establish online privacy (real or imagined). In this work, the body inhabits and hides inside a digital shell in the form of a translucent glass avatar, speaking to the pseudonymous nature of web3—pfps, usernames, wallet addresses—where one can ironically be known for being unknown.

3. Here and Elsewhere by Brendan Dawes @brendandawes with music by Sion Trefor @SionTrefor
“I like people who dream or talk to themselves interminably; I like them, for they are double. They are here and elsewhere.”
― Albert Camus.

When things are forbidden it takes dreamers to venture into the unknown and challenge perceived norms. Inspired by an Albert Camus quote, dreams and deliberate actions give rise to new forms, structures and possibilities where there was previously darkness.

4. Atom 1259 (89 seconds Atomized collection) by Eve Sussman  
89 seconds Atomized shatters the final artist's proof of Eve Sussman's acclaimed video 89 seconds at Alcazár into 2,304 unique blocks, to create a new artwork on the blockchain. An experiment in ownership and collective interaction, the piece can be reassembled and screened at will by the community of collectors.

What excites you when selecting artists’ work, how do they make their way into your collection?

The story of the artist, the concepts behind the works, and the level of innovation! I like to know the story behind the artists I collect (connect w them whenever possible), I am not looking at a particular genre or aesthetic. Conceptually innovative works are for me important to highlight!

How do you discover new work?

Artist residencies, curated shows and platforms (small ones like verse.works or vca), twitter - rarely.

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

DYOR and listen to the artists.

Georg Bak

I am very passionate about digital art and made my passion into my profession. Besides advising clients I am also a collector myself. I am collecting vintage digital art from the 1960s as well as NFTs. I also use my LinkedIn account since several years to share interesting news and facts about digital art, NFTs and the metaverse to help people to get more familiar with the topics.

Georg Bak keeps his collection private, so here is a photo with Aleksandra Art (myself) at Boreta AV at Art Basel Miami 2022.

How do you go about collecting artists’ work?

Many artworks I choose to collect have a historical relevance. I also collect art from befriended artists. When I look at digital art, I am interested in technical or visual innovation as well as complexity. What excites me most are artworks which are entering the canon of digital art history because they are the first of its kind. 

How do you discover new work?

Quite often I get recommendations by artists, curators or collectors. Sometimes I am also checking some accounts of other collectors.

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

Collecting is a very personal thing; you look at someones collection and you know who that person is. When I advise collectors they are mostly interested in new trends or NFTs as an investment. 

Maria @marygeorgie1

I have a background in traditional Finance and fell down the genart rabbit hole about a year ago. While I have always been an art lover, the (to me) new concept of genart blew my away! I love collecting, researching about artists and new developments in the space ever since!

Highlights from the collection:

1. horizon(te)s #396 by Iskra Velitchkova @pointline_ and Zach Lieberman @zachlieberman
For this collaboration, the artists focused on horizons as an organizing principle. What are the edges and borders of our vision and what do we see there?

2. Aspergo #33 by dmarchi @dmarchi___
A practice on texturing abstract paintings. Up to three techniques are applied by the painter to compose each image.

3. Anticyclone #479 by William Mapan @williamapan
High pressure, rotation, air flow… The "Anticyclone" series is an artistic exploration and interpretation of those concepts. The rendering borrows its aesthetics from traditional and organic media like paper and crayons, to lend an analog/archival look. "Can a computer draw like a human?" The question is asked and challenged once more through "Anticyclone".

What made you select these three works to highlight?

Zach Lieberman: I love Zach Liebermans works and I knew I needed to get a piece from his first longform project. I think he has a unique way in showing the interplay of colors and transitions.

Dmarchi: Dmarchi has a few great very painterly looking projects on fxhash with brush strokes that look like real paintings. Aspergo has a very impressionist aesthetics to me. I loved his works from the beginning and am excited to see what comes next.

William Mapan: Anticyclone is probably my favorite longform project of all. I love how William Mapan creates these incredible different textures and colors!

Is there anything particular you look for when picking a new addition to your collection?

It is probably more a feeling than a theme I am looking for in a collection or a piece. I am also really interested in the concept, art historical references and the process behind the work, which is why I love it when there is some more information/interview or similar provided by the artist.

How do you discover new work?

Mostly via Twitter and collections from people I am following. I recently also detected the discovery tool from RCS, which seems promising. I also try to follow new drops on fxhash and also artblocks.

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

Starting to collect can be pretty overwhelming as there are so many platforms and art already available. I therefore think that Tezos is a great way to start collecting, as costs are relatively low compared to e.g. ETH and collecting can be a bit more playful with less pressure in the beginning. If you are interested and spend some time in the space, follow certain people and platforms you will get a feeling for the space pretty quickly.

ballislife @delta_alpha_ohm

Collectooor, rabbit hole researcher.

Highlights from the collection:

1. Positive tension by FEELS @FEELSxart

2. Organized Glitch .::....: by Itzel Yard @ix_shells

3. 🐥🪱 - A bird as if a worm as a bird as a worm | for Bird and Worm Society by Iskra Velitchkova @pointline_

4. Untitled (Genesis) by William Mapan @williamapan

I search for value via research and base it off of intuition, aesthetics, as well as cultural and historical importance

How do you discover new work?

Twitter, frens, Discord and word of mouth.

Premala @premalamatthen

Art Market Advisor with a Finance background, turned Web3 Investor/ Collector

Highlights from the collection:

1. Bitchcoin #02.148 by Sarah Meyohas @SarahMeyohas
Predating the launch of Ethereum by five months, in February 2015 conceptual artist Sarah Meyohas released the first tokenization of art on the blockchain: Bitchcoin.

2. Doodle #6849 by @doodles
A collection of 10,000 NFTs (non-fungible tokens) that are made up of hundreds of exciting visual traits designed by Burnt Toast.

3. Chromie Squiggle #874 by Snowfro @ArtOnBlockchain
Simple and easily identifiable, each squiggle embodies the soul of the Art Blocks platform. Consider each as a personal signature by Snowfro as an artist, developer, and tinkerer. 

4. Anticyclone #279 by William Mapan @williamapan
High pressure, rotation, air flow… The "Anticyclone" series is an artistic exploration and interpretation of those concepts. The rendering borrows its aesthetics from traditional and organic media like paper and crayons, to lend an analog/archival look. "Can a computer draw like a human?" The question is asked and challenged once more through "Anticyclone".

5. CloneX #6969 by @RTFKT and Takashi Murakami @takashipom
RTFKT, together with Takashi Murakami, brought his iconic designs to the 20,000 NFTs. From Eyes, Mouths, Helmets to Clothes, these avatars will have a special Murakami Drip property defined on the blockchain.

6. First NFT #9669 by 0xDEAFBEEF @_deafbeef
First satirical on-chain generative text NFT about NFT firsts. Don't sleep on this historic collection.

7. Contractions #219 by Loie Hollowell
Loie Hollowell’s first-ever NFT project, titled Contractions, comprises 280 unique, generative works that center on the artist’s embodied experiences with childbirth. Based on Hollowell’s Split Orb sculptural paintings, which she began creating following the birth of her second child, the Contractions NFTs feature two bifurcated orbs situated one on top of the other, with the top orb representing the artist’s brain and the lower orb signifying her pregnant belly and cervix…

What made you select these works to highlight?

All examples of historic blue-chip art and collectibles that I love and am honoured to possess.

How do go about adding new art to the collection?

I need to love the work, then it is about other value drivers such as historic significance, cultural significance, technological significance, etc > there are 100 factors, the last layer of analysis is investment value - I would like to say monetary value is irrelevant, but I do want the work I own to be relevant for the wider market as well. I could go on endlessly about this topic because I specialise in Collectibles as an Alternative Asset.

How do you discover new work?

Twitter, Instagram, Art fairs and events

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

Check the integrity of the contract, validity of IP, security of storage - lastly, get a hardware wallet

Colborn @co1born

Presently, I find myself thinking about the global monocultural and assorted means to effectuate broad structural and systemic change. I am broadly and gravely concerned for our collective future and believe there is a massive need for new leaders and institutions to emerge which incubate alternative ideologies. Fighting my own existential dread, I try to leave as much of myself onchain as possible. 

1. The Great American Supernova (still from gif) by @ROBNESSOFFICIAL

2. Death of an AI by Leo Isikdogan @leoisikdogan

3. THIS ISN'T EVEN ART by Max Osiris @maxosirisart

4. Andrew Jackson on Acid (still from gif) by @Zebbler

5. r/EarthPorn/Night-River by zaza 

6. Self-reflection by Mikedotalmond @mikedotalmond

7. Could words be the art by Brandon Walsh @NFTWannabe

What excites you in the works shared? How did they make their way into your collection?

I find there is a collective exasperation in the game we have constructed for ourselves.  i am witness to (and perhaps facilitating) a tremendous escapism from this reality.  i am equally witness to some brilliant and passionate individuals who push against this tide.  i think these works are precursors or warning signals to what will inevitably be a colossal collapse of society. our society is one of spectacle, in which authentic social life has been replaced by its representation, interactions dictated strictly by the commodities we are perceived to hold.  this curation is more reflective of my current mood than of the collection.  im not sure these works excite me, but i purchased them because i thought they were prescient, and it was nice to know other people were experiencing and reflecting similar feelings.

Is there anything particular you look for in a work? How do you make your decisions to collect? 

Yes, but to describe it would really be futile because it is a constantly shifting ever evolving feeling that revolves around my growth as an individual. It's almost like I don't know what I'm looking for until I find it.  experientially i would describe it as hearing a song from your past, one you haven't heard in a while, and being immediately transported back to that moment in time, except the experience is in reverse. I look for works that transport me to the edge of the future or trigger and allow me to extrapolate on an ontology that posits how we got there. Because when I understand how we got there, I can reorient my present to reflect this new information and I feel myself growing. 

How do you discover new work? 

I spend a lot of time in the MOCA Community Collection, which is a collection of 9000 artworks contributed by our 3600+ users.  i enjoy it because it removes artworks from a market context, is randomized every 24 hours, and is aggregated based on the preference of other collectors. This is where I go when i'm looking for something that catches my eye for raw discovery.  

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

Sure I have plenty of advice, feel free to contact me to discuss. The best advice I ever heard was from artnome and paraphrased that is "buy art you love, from artists you want to support, at prices you can afford, and you'll never be disappointed" or something like that.

Debussy @Debussy100

I love collecting beautiful works of art

hello admin dm me by XCOPY

Collection: JEB9

What can we find in your collection?

Some of these are NFT artists that have become "bluechip" and some are up and coming artists that I think have a bright future in the space. I found them by interacting with them and looking to see if they're in the NFT space for the long-term and not to just make a quick penny.

How do you discover new work? 

Twitter

Is there any advice you'd give to someone interested in collecting art on the Blockchain?

My advice would be to take your time and talk to the artist. Try to find an artist that is doing something different and that is here to help grow the NFT space. Also, don't fall into the twitter hype machine when you see bigger names pumping an artist. Finally, always listen to your gut.

NFTs and Generative Art: Women Working with Code

It’s been a while since I’ve had a chance to publish on my personal blog. But key things remain, including the timeliness of our commentary and efforts towards building space with equal opportunities. If 2021 was a rollercoaster for artistic creativity within web3, in 2022, we somehow collectively accepted that the world is changing at an accelerated pace and are just trying to keep up.

I thought enough players had entered the space since my early rambling about why digital art is fascinating. But it seems that is not enough since there is still room for awareness. After seeing an all-male generative and algorithmic works exhibition announced, it felt like a good idea to highlight some of the amazing women artists working with code and Blockchain.

As defined by Tate, generative art typically refers to art made using a predetermined system that often includes an element of chance and is usually applied to computer-based art. Blockchain has enabled a new, somewhat participatory role of the audience to interact with the medium, allowing buyers to be directly part of the creation process as the works become minted at the time of purchase. We’ve seen marketplaces and artists working to create unique experiences where the time of day, latitude, or wallet address can determine the final output.

Moving on from the prologue, let’s dive into a highlight (that I intend to grow) of some women artists that have caught my attention over the years. Descriptions taken from profile bios or written up based on collections.

Iskra Velitchkova @pointline_

Collection: Generative nature. Name: no name I, Iskra Velitchkova, 2021

Iskra Velitchkova is a Bulgarian artist based in Madrid. In her work, Velitchkova explores the present and potential interactions between humans and machines, and how instead of making technology more human, this relationship can push us to better understand our limits. She believes that roots and tradition can nurture her work with greater truth.

fxhash profile

Feral File profile

Aleksandra Jovanić @alexis_o_O

Herbarium, 2022, Aleksandra Jovanić

Aleksandra Jovanić is an artist and programmer from Belgrade, Serbia, where she teaches at the new media department at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Belgrade. She was part of the first cohort of artists to exhibit at Art Basel in 2022 in Hong Kong as part of the Tezos-based platform generative art platform fxhash live minting experience. Visitors of the art fair were able to set up a Tezos wallet at the show and mint a free edition of the Herbarium collection.

fxhash profile

Anna Lucia @annaluciacodes

Loom, Anna Lucia, 2021

Anna Lucia is an artist and engineer, and her preferred medium is computer programming. She writes compositional instructions to be executed by a computer within a space of randomness. Her aesthetic is characterized by geometric abstraction and bold color palettes.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Melissa Wiederrecht @mwiederrecht

Orbs, Melissa Wiederrecht, 2022

Melissa Wiederrecht is a Generative Artist from America. She uses code (any and all sorts) and procedural processes (of any sort) to generate her art. She is a computer scientist (MS) and machine learning engineer by education, but an artist at heart. Her work ranges from surface pattern design collections to NFT collections on the blockchain.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Hiro Ozaki @Sputniko

The Nursery, Sputniko!, 2022

Sputniko is a multi-media artist and filmmaker creating works on the themes of technology, gender, and feminism. Her work has been exhibited across major international museums and she was awarded Vogue Japan Woman of the Year in 2013. Sputniko taught at the MIT Media Lab as an Assistant Professor and is currently an Associate Professor at the Tokyo University of Arts. For The Nursery, Sputniko's first edition of 100 NFTs at Bright Moments in London, the artist collaborated with a female programmer and designer, Misaki Nakano.

OpenSea Collection

Sarah Ridgley @sarah_ridgley

Himinn, Sarah Ridgley, 2021

Sarah Ridgley is an internationally exhibited generative artist that has been minting work since 2019. Her work focuses and blaring the boundaries between the hand-drawn and the computer-drawn, reflecting human touch in machine-made work. Ridgley uses Processing (p5js) and JavaScript to build her programs, and designs her own algorithmic brushes to complete each piece. There is also a frequent tribute to Poetry in her work, including the series “The Lover’s Case” for theVERSEverse poetry NFT gallery that was made using the artists asemic writing algorithm to explore symbology in dialogue with the meaningless.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Emily Xie @emilyxxie

Memories of Qilin, Emily Xie, 2022

Emily Xie is a NYC-based generative artist and engineer. She works with algorithms to create lifelike textures, patterns, and forms which are often encoded with elements of her own culture and femininity.

Art Blocks profile

Objkt profile

Alida Sun @alidasun

glitch crystal monsters, Alida Sun, 2021

New York raised and Internet-based artist Alida Sun has studied industrial design with a Bauhaus foundation school. Her current studio practice is primarily concerned with assemblage, fluid dynamics, time crystals, and experimental humanities.

Art Blocks profile

Sofia Crespo @soficrespo91

neural swarm, Sofia Crespo, 2022

Lisbon-based Sofia Crespo is an artist working with a huge interest in biology-inspired technologies. One of her main focuses is the way organic life uses artificial mechanisms to simulate itself and evolve, this implying the idea that technologies are a biased product of the organic life that created them and not a completely separated object.

Feral File profile

Amy Goodchild @amygoodchild

Maplands, Amy Goodchild, 2022

London-based artist Amy Goodchild uses a mix of code and other technology to create art which explores generativity, group experience, and interaction.

fxhash profile

Melissa Rodriguez @hellomelissarod

Lunar, Melissa Rodriguez, 2021

Artist and creative coder Melissa Rodriguez began her journey in 2018 learning p5.js and currently primarily uses Processing.

Objkt profile

Anna Carreras @carreras_anna

Trossets, Anna Carreras, 2021

Barcelona-based creative coder and digital artist Anna Carreras is interested in experimentation on interactive communication. Her work focuses on the use of generative algorithms, creative code and interactive technology as a means of communication and an experience generator.

Art Blocks profile

Monica Rizzolli @MonicaRizzolli

Fragments of an Infinite Field, Monica Rizzolli, 2021

Monica Rizzolli is best known for her computer so wares that transform environmental cues into landscape animations. The simulations explore themes such as: the image of the city, environmental psychology and the human perception of space. Rizzolli currently lives and works in São Paulo.

Art Blocks profile

Jess Hewitt @rustysniper1

Divergent Convergence, Jess Hewitt, 2022

Jess Hewitt is an artist, developer and the co-founder of Generative Toys, providing tools for creators to produce generative art. Her work mainly focuses on abstract digital art, generative, AI-assisted and glitch art, inspired by the psychedelic, surreal and playful.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Teia profile

Kaoru Tanaka @v_kaoru

廻る, Still, Kaoru Tanaka, 2021

Kaoru Tanaka is a digital artist based in Japan who creates real-time generative art and experiments. In July 2022 she has worked with Richie Hawtin (performed by Manami Sakamoto) for the Prada Extends cultural series that celebrates the creative community, connecting Japanese culture, music and internationally renown artists.

Foundation profile

Helena Sarin @NeuralBricolage

Artificial Blues, a Sketchbook, from the Etchings of Latentscaux series, Helena Sarin, 2022

Pioneering visual artist and software engineer Helena Sarin has worked at Bell Labs, designing commercial communication systems, and for the last few years as an independent consultant, developing computer vision software using deep learning. Sarin finds inspiration in unifying patterns of nature and computation. The artist uses Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) that reveal some of these patterns and reassembles them in intriguing ways. She strives for her generative artwork to be not only interesting and aesthetically pleasing, but to reflect the characteristics of her analog art—improvised, bold, and deeply personal.

Foundation profile

Superrare profile

Itzel Yard @ix_shells

How do you feel?, Itzel Yard, 2021

Known under her artist name IX Shells, Itzel Yard is a Panamanian-based artist and self taught coder. In 2021 she became the highest-selling female NFT artist with the $2 million sale of her artwork “Dreaming at Dusk”. The artist trained herself in coding and various computer process languages ​while simultaneously studying architectural technology in Toronto.

Foundation profile

Ivona Tau @ivonatau

Mythic Latent Glitches, Ivona Tau, 2022

Ivona Tau is an award-winning generative AI artist exploring the subjective world interpretations, fragmented memories and emotional states by training custom neural networks on photography. Her work “VISIONS: reflected” was one of the early tokenised works sold at Sotheby's in 2021.

Foundation profile

LIA @liasomething

little boxes on the hillsides, child, LIA, 2021

Austrian artist LIA is considered one of the pioneers of software and net art and has been producing works since 1995. Her practice spans across video, performance, software, installations, sculpture, projections and digital applications.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Nadieh Bremer @NadiehBremer

Twistings, Nadien Bremer, 2022

Nadieh Bremer is an award-winning data visualization designer and artist, working from a small town near Amsterdam, with a background in data science. In 2011 she graduated as an Astronomer from the University of Leiden. As a freelancing data visualization designer, Bremer’s projects include web-based (subtly) interactive visualizations. They mostly focus on static visualizations that allow freedom in their design, and creating data art where the final result could be framed on a wall, or can be used as branding or marketing material.

Art Blocks profile

fxhash profile

Lisa Orth @LisaOrthStudio

Suspended Pathways : Aqua 00a, Lisa Orth, 2022

A creative polymath, Lisa began her artistic path in Seattle as a graphic designer and art director. Since entering the NFT art space in 2020, Lisa’s been focused on creating abstract generative art with processing and p5.js. Over the past two years, her generative art has been exhibited at conferences, galleries and museums around the globe.

fxhash profile

Objkt profile

This is a non exhaustive list of talented women artists using code in creative way. You can add suggestions here.

AI Artists, What Are You Selling: An Image, A Neural Network Or A Story?

Mario Klingemann’s illustration, inspired by the Dung Beetle Learning series

The last couple of years have marked a turning point for AI art. Major auction houses, such as Sotheby's and Christie's introduced pieces made using machine learning. Creative AI platforms such as Playform.io allowed anyone remotely familiar with technology to upload datasets and generate images. Artists coming from traditional media began outsourcing their artwork production to those familiar with the tools to keep up with the rising demand of our digital culture. In this article, together with prominent digital artists and experts, we explore art market perceptions towards AI art. To properly understand where the initiatives are heading, I ask a question – what is it that creators of AI art are selling? This inquiry allows shedding light on some of the shortcomings that the market currently faces when it comes to an understanding of the subject. It also calls for a point of view that would consider the broader context of tech culture.

When it comes to art, there are currently two groups of practitioners exploring AI and its contributions to the creative industry. First is Computational Creativity, the field that concerns itself with theoretical and practical issues in the study of creativity. Primarily, the group explores whether computers can be creative on their own and how could this be achieved. The second movement is the Creative AI movement. The focus in Creative AI lies more towards the widespread applications of AI tools to produce cultural goods. Some examples of the Creative AI include generative art, AI-written symphonies and even poems. One particularly fun example is a science fiction film 'Sunspring', in which actors were hired to act out a script written by an AI bot (clip below).

In the wake of Google's AI Go victory, filmmaker Oscar Sharp turned to his technologist collaborator Ross Goodwin to build a machine that could write screenplays. They created "Jetson" and fueled him with hundreds of sci-fi TV and movie scripts.

For the movie, music and literature industries new technology is nothing new. The effect of AI content production on the fields is particularly interesting to consider. However, in this article, the focus is on the industry where the processes are not as clearly defined when it comes to using technology – the art market.

A machine learning system that is currently most commonly used among AI artists is the generative adversarial network (GAN). Ian Goodfellow and his colleagues developed GAN while he was working as a research scientist at Google. A simple explanation by Google describes GANs as generative models, which create new data that resemble your training data.

For example, GANs trained on human portraits can create images that look like photographs of human faces, even though the people depicted do not exist. A good example of GAN in practice is the work of Mike Tyka, an AI artist and technologist at Google. Mike’s project ‘Portraits of Imaginary People’ (below), featured at Ars Electronica Festival ’17, explored the latent space of human faces by training an artificial neural network to imagine and generate portraits of non-existent people. To do so, he fed GAN with thousands of photos of faces he collected from Flickr.

On October 2018, Ahmed Elgammal, Professor of Computer Vision and an AI artist, published an article titled 'With AI Art, Process Is More Important Than the Product'. Dr Elgammal argued that AI art is conceptual art, an art form that began in the 1960s, in which the idea represented is considered more important than the finished object. "It's about the creative process – one that involves an artist and a machine collaborating to explore new visual forms in revolutionary ways," he wrote.

The notion of the artist and the machine 'collaborating' humanizes the latter. The idea of humanizing technology is nothing new. We gave names to natural language processing devices such as Siri and Alexa. We create robots that look like humans. However, these products address the market from a consumer standpoint. By humanizing the machine an artist works with, we take away the credit for the artists' work.

Mimesis, "imitation" in Greek, refers to nature and human behaviour mimicked in the arts. Art imitates life, so to say. In almost all areas of our professional experience, we use technology to aid us in our work. However, we do not give salary to our machines. Neither we credit them in our reports. Similarly, how can we consider giving credit to the machine for an artwork?

GANs provide a new way for artists to experiment, but they also cause a stir of thought. "What is Art?" is a subject of discussion throughout centuries. With the rise of AI, we have a new question that asks "Who is the Artist?". A group of professionals in the field of new media art share a view that AI is simply a tool to create the artwork, like a paintbrush.

2018 Lumen Prize Gold Award winner: Mario Klingemann’s piece ‘The Butcher’s Son’. A neural network’s interpretation of the human form.

Mario Klingemann, a known artist and a winner of Lumen Prize, the award for art and technology, compares AI to the piano. "If you hear somebody playing the piano, would you ever ask if the piano is the artist? No. So same thing here: just because it's a complicated mechanism, it doesn't change the roads" he explains in an interview with Sotheby’s. Carla Rapoport, who runs the Lumen Prize for eight years now, agrees. "Cavemen used sticks and coloured mud - today's visual artists use algorithms, among other tools. A number of shortlisted artists this year, for example, incorporated AI tools into a wider work, either moving image or sculptural.

The work by Jake Elwes, CUSP, shortlisted this year, fits into this category. He used an AI tool to create his birds and then 'set' them into a filmed landscape" she shares. Both Jake Elwes and Mario Klingmann use AI as an element of their work, a tool. They do so by either creating installations to stream the generated images or by integrating GAN images as an element of a video piece.

However, the tool itself is not the creator, neither it is a work of art. What artists choose to create using that tool holds more substantial value. However, does this apply to any digital device? With companies such as Acute Art and Khora Contemporary, allowing any artist to become a VR artist, has the technical knowledge become irrelevant?

It is necessary to approach the digital field within the context of digital culture. When famous artists of the past centuries outsourced their work, it wasn't because they couldn't do it themselves. "It's not that people couldn't do it, it's just not worth their time… Henry Moore I'm sure knew all about working in bronze" shares Michael Takeo Magruder, an internationally acclaimed digital artist. In a non-digital medium, if an artist wants to use another artist's style, they would still have to create the artwork themselves.

When it comes to digital tools, and especially AI, however, the process is fluid. And since the practice is relatively new, the market lacks the understanding to provide constructive feedback. Established critics from the traditional medium evaluate the worth of a digital piece under traditional measures and context of the art world, if at all. There is a level of scepticism present due to the infant stage of the movement. (Since I wrote this, I witnessed Jonathan Jones, an art critic at the Guardian, referring to AI as "Bullshit" at a recent panel).

Michael continues, "For myself, I don't do the heavy lifting, but I know absolutely what is possible… I understand the medium, and I come from that scene. When all of these artists and academics want to talk about digital, it's like yeah but do you really understand it, the culture?."

Michael Takeo Magruder, detail of Imaginary Cities — Paris (11097701034), 2019. Algorithmically generated mono prints on 23ct gold-gilded board. Photo: David Steele © Michael Takeo Magruder.

The 'culture' that Michael is referring to is the tech culture, the gamers, coders, and tech enthusiasts. Some traditional art market professionals may perceive the tech culture as 'outsider' culture in the art world. Another similar outsider culture is often considered street art. Michael considers Banksy as one of the greatest contemporary artists. He notes that although street art has an ecosystem of its own, Banksy demonstrates a thorough understanding of art and pays tribune to notable traditional artists in his work.

Both the street art culture and digital culture bring something new to the art world. However, when it comes to digital art, we see a different phenomenon. Established traditional artists begin to outsource their work to VR or AI specialists. While doing so, the artist receives all the recognition, using his name as a brand. But what if this happened in street art, what if David Hockney all of a sudden started doing graffiti, would the market recognize him as a prominent street artist? I doubt it (but who knows, right?).

A week after Dr Elgammal described AI art as conceptual, the first AI artwork sold at a major auction. Obvious, the Paris-based collective that produced the work used 15000 portraits painted between the 14th and 20th century to feed the system. By taking the available data of Renaissance paintings, the artist collective used GAN to create a fictional character, referred to as Edmond de Belamy (pictured in the family tree below). The press loved the story of the sale, especially since the work fetched an incredible sum of over $400,000 at Christie's.

The collective indeed demonstrated the highest level of salesmanship and marketing. Some would call it  'state of the art'. The story, however, sparked a level of criticism when the audience learned that another artist, Robbie Barrat, made the algorithm they used in creating their work. "We are the people who decided to do this, who decided to print it on canvas, sign it as a mathematical formula, put it in a gold frame," defended their actions Obvious when asked about their lack of credit to Barrat. However, the level of inquiry had limits due to the lack of understanding about who borrowed what from whom.

Obvious’ first collection is a series of 11 ‘realistics’ portraits generated by GANs. They used it to create a fictional family titled the Belamy Family.

The chain of code would be a rabbit hole if one were to point out to try and establish who made a more significant contribution. Just consider the following: Since Ian Goodfellow's development of GANs, researchers have been using its open access for various adaptations. Namely, Facebook's Soumith Chintala partnered with Alex Radford, a researcher at Indico Data Solutions, to improve Goodfellow's GANs, so they work better with images. The collaboration was a component that further adapted the code for artistic practice.

After cooperating with Radford, Soumith shared the implementation on Github, an open-source for developers to share their work. Only after Soumith shared his work on Github did the code reach Robbie Barrat, who then made additional improvements by adding scrapers and pretrained models. Hence, the line is blurred when deciding between Barrat, Soumith, Radford or Goodfellow as the contributors to Obvious' piece. Therefore, all of the players, to a certain degree, can be considered to have contributed to Obvious' work. And yet, only one of them was called out.

In short, while we refer to AI  as a 'tool', we also can't deny that, with its complexity, it's a different kind of tool when compared to traditional material methods. There is value in the context within which the works are created and presented. Otherwise, the artist is most likely to be misunderstood. So what are the artists selling then? "Perhaps the term for AI art might be a 'generative story'?" suggests Carla. "But certainly not a neural network, as an oil painting wouldn't be identified by the brush or the chemicals chosen to create it." she adds.

Mike Tyka comments that "significance comes from the process, its implications and the connection to what else is happening in the AI field". He draws attention to the fact that knowledge about the AI field (the 'culture' that we discussed in the beginning) is a relevant factor when it comes to evaluating AI art.

Meanwhile, sceptics like Jonathan Jones from the traditional art world, argue that the AI works currently produced should be dismissed altogether since they lack aesthetic qualities. As an example, take a look at this conversation between Jason Bailey, founder of an art and tech publication about cutting-edge technology in art, and senior art critic and columnist for New York Magazine Jerry Saltz. Jason argues, that “The problem is nothing in traditional art world training has prepared the current gate keepers to understand or speak intelligently about the nuance of generative art.”.

On the one hand, you have the sceptics, the traditional art critics, judging the works based on their aesthetic qualities. On the other hand, you have computer scientists, researchers, and practitioners of AI, who are exploring new ways of what's possible and yet not fully understood. In near future, machines will become more sophisticated and accessible, causing a wider range of artists to adapt them in their work. Initiatives that could facilitate a dialogue between the two groups can enhance our experience and perception of the new medium. We are in an era where Art and Technology is a confluence, not a juxtaposition.

EONS is a short animation, a moving painting, a music video and an experiment in creating narrative using neural networks. EONS was created entirely using artificial neural nets: The Generative Adversarial Net BigGAN (Andrew Brock et al.) was used to create the visuals, while the Music was composed by Music Transformer (Anna Huang et al.). http://www.miketyka.com

Mike Tyka’s "EONS" - a video made entirely using #BigGAN, scored with Anna Huang’s #MusicTransformer