b. 1976

Hideki Tsukamoto is a generative artist who rose to prominence on 1st January 2021 with the Art Blocks Curated release of his iconic Singularity collection. Visually mesmerising, Singularity takes inspiration from creation and destruction on a giant scale, and uses data from the transaction hash to determine the unique characteristics of each artistic form. The project sold out in 40 minutes, and established Tsukamoto as a key generative artist to watch. Selected works have since featured in the curated NFT collections and auctions at leading digital galleries and mainstream art houses such as Sotheby’s and Christie’s. 

Featuring his trademark circular motifs and often drawing on scientific concepts, Tsukamoto's artworks render vast themes in intricate detail, with thematic threads creating continuity and connection across his work. Singularity was the first of four generative collections in the Origins series, which focuses on space, creation, matter and void. The second, Fusion, which depicts microscopic forms, was dropped in October 2021 using technology built from scratch by Tsukamoto and his team. 

Tsukamoto’s fascination with procedural generation began in the early 1990s with the work of William Latham, a pioneer of Generative Art. Also inspired by cinematography and film post-production processes, his work has an expansive, cinematic quality, best exemplified in the forthcoming Monument collection.

Describing his artistic process, Tsukamoto notes: “I generally set out to recreate something visual in a procedural manner. Often I have a system or an algorithm in mind, paired to a way of describing something more figurative - the subject might be something I want to emulate, or something visual that inspired me. Starting with a basic implementation, I’ll experiment with approaches that best represent the subject with and with an overarching concept in mind. The process is exploratory, but there is always a specific visual starting point; with Singularity it was sun-lit clouds, with Fusion it was Butterfly Koi. Blockchain adds another layer to this as NFTs present the ability to innovate not just within the frame but across the mechanics of the whole project, as illustrated by my Fusion collection, which mutates and evolves over time.”

Tsukamoto is the artistic identity and pseudonym of a UK-based British artist who prefers to remain anonymous. Entirely self-taught, his career began in the 1990s when his ability to create art with code was recognised by the MoD, who commissioned him to create landscapes for their early VR helicopter simulators. He then went on to work in design for print, where his generative artwork appeared on album and book covers. Later moving into video-games, working across many programming languages, frameworks and game engines, his ability to bridge the artistic and technical disciplines made him a much sought-after asset in the development of procedural systems and generative tools.