Agnieszka Kurant

100 seismic historic events, millions of harvested Twitter and Reddit posts, and billions of aggregated human emotions shape Sentimentite’s 100 geological-like forms. When redeemed, these Expanded NFTs state-change to physical sculptures cast in Agnieszka Kurant’s fictional material: Sentimentite. She has pulverised over 40 objects used as currencies throughout history into this new mineral-currency. “Today,” Kurant says, “our contemporary global economy is based on conversions of crowd dynamics and social energy into information and capital. Tweets, shares and likes are the new oil and gas.

Sentiment Data

Sentimentite—Kurant’s speculative mineral-currency of the future—investigates the relationship between digital capitalism and geology. Inspired by the way natural forces shape rocks and meteorites over deep time, Sentimentite’s evolving geological-like forms are shaped by changes in 21st century society: one hundred ruptures, revolutions, disasters and future dreams. Sentiment analysis data is harvested from hundreds of thousands of Twitter and Reddit posts related to recent historic events across 10 Chapters of 100 Events (see below table). Collaborating with Justin Lane, CEO and Co-Founder at CulturePulse, this expansive data capture is syphoned into individual digital forms, where it becomes the catalyst for morphological and aesthetic transformation. Kurant has compressed the recent human and ecological past into her own data-driven, speculative geology.

Mapping Global Emotion

To realise the data tranche across the 100 virtual forms, Kurant worked with 3D artist and developer Gabriel Stones. The multitude of emotion-driven datapoints are projected onto the digitally composed 3D models as sets of parameters and rules for transforming and morphing the forms’ size, shape, weight, form, colour, density and texture. Sentimentite’s uncanny, otherworldly quality, “proposes an alternative way of producing artworks,” she says, “where singular authorship is replaced by complex collective forms.”

A New Material

When redeemed, the Sentimentite Expanded NFTs state-change to physical sculptures cast in Kurant’s fictional material: Sentimentite. Kurant identified over 60 objects used as official and informal currencies throughout history (see table below), and then sourced these materials from global hotspots of commerce and production. Working with Noël Hochuli at Kunstgiesserei St. Gallen AG, the materials are then all ground down and pulverised to make the Sentimentite mineral-currency. Kunstgiesserei custom-fabricates a 3D sculptural mould of each redeemed NFT digital form. The new pulverised mix is then mixed with an acrystal resin, and poured into the mould. After setting, the mould is gently broken off. Finally, the surface is treated with a fine layer of acid which reveals more of the 3D texture details. The end result is striking, uncanny, and otherworldly: a synthesis of millions of people and their invisible machined emotions.

Agnieszka Kurant

The New York based artist Agnieszka Kurant has collaborated with cognitive scientists, economists, clairvoyants, Amazon Mechanical Turks, talking parrots and termite colonies. Her multimedia output explores the power of collective intelligence in our extreme information societies. “Kurant probes the uncertainties of the volatile present and unknowable future through projects that verge on scientific experiments,” wrote The New York Times. This is art that challenges our assumptions about what it means to be human today.

Kurant has worked with the Machine Intelligence department of Google, the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology and won the LACMA Art + Technology Award. Her work is in some of the world’s most prominent collections, including MoMA, Guggenheim Museum, SFMOMA, Nicoletta Fiorucci and Fondazione Sandretto di Rebaudengo. Instagram’s co-founder Mike Krieger and his wife Kaitlyn Trigger’s acquisition of Kurant’s Phantom Library was the very first artwork of their collection.

Production costs

The material sculptures are produced onsite at Kunstgiesserei St. Gallen AG in Switzerland and can be redeemed at one of two sizes:

• [A] 25cm diameter ($9,600)
• [B] 50cm diameter ($48,000)

All 100 Sentimentite sculptures can be produced at 25cm diameter size. Only 10 can be cast at 50cm diameter, available on a first-come, first-served basis. The above prices do not include shipping.

Kunstgiesserei St. Gallen AG guarantee production of Sentimentite sculptures within three years of the drop date. Thereafter production will be at the discretion of Kunstgiesserei St. Gallen AG, or any alternative fabricators arranged by Zien and the artist. The material sculptures are produced as a bespoke service, therefore the production timeline will vary. We estimate 3 months for fabrication and delivery, with an exact timeframe provided at the moment of redemption.

Key information about the state-change from digital to physical artwork — including dates, costs, photographic records of the work and a condition report — are referenced on-chain with the Expanded NFT. The material sculpture is also accompanied by a physical certificate of authenticity.

Credits

Sentimentite is a collaboration between Agnieszka Kurant and Zien.

Supported by Zora.

Data analysis by Justin Lane, CEO and Co-Founder at CulturePulse.

3D modelling by Gabriel Stones, 3D artist and developer working in film, installation and games.

Physical fabrication project management by Sonja Schürpf and Noël Hochuli at Kunstgiesserei St. Gallen AG.