A finite period, treated as one.
AB5D treats the first five hundred Art Blocks projects, the AB[500], as a closed cultural period: the first era of generative art native to a blockchain, complete in itself. Periods in art history are usually drawn long after the fact, and drawn loosely. This one has a hard edge, written into the chain.
The work of AB5D is the work of any early institution: assemble the body of work, document it, argue for it, and hold it together so that it can be seen whole. The collection is the argument.
Read more →Work from every series.
The collection holds work from 488 of 500 projects in the AB[500], assembled in a single wallet and visible in full on Art Blocks, where its state is always current and verifiable against the chain.
View the collection on Art Blocks ↗ The 308 artists → The atlas →From the collection
The period, examined.
Essays on the artists, the algorithms, and the material history of the first five hundred projects.
The 308, documented one at a time.
A sourced essay and a verified bibliography for every AB[500] artist, written to a published standard and checked by machine. 308 of 308 complete. The newest entries:
The institution, documented as carefully as the artists.
Policies, decisions, programs, accession records, preservation limits, and revisions. Every material record carries a stable identifier, public source formats, and a correction path.
Collectors: The people the period belongs to.
A network of collectors, artists, and institutions around early Art Blocks documented over time, not ranked.
The ownership register →The archive and the DAO are different things.
DAO membership is by invitation. Membership, governance and token work forthcoming.