DEAFBEEF

DEAFBEEF (0xDEAFBEEF) is a pseudonymous Canadian generative artist who became one of the defining figures of fully on-chain art in 2021. Working with nothing but a text editor, a C compiler and the Ethereum blockchain, he writes low level C programs that generate raw numerical data interpreted as both sound and image, so each token's audiovisual output is reconstructed entirely from code stored on-chain. His first cycle of work, Volume 1, spans six series: Synth Poems, Angular, Transmission, Entropy, Glitchbox and Advection. Synth Poems are short generative music pieces inspired by analog synthesizers, each generated at mint from a random hash that shapes tempo, timbre, pitch and time signature, paired with visuals that nod to early vector display graphics. Entropy pushed the concept further: the code degrades the piece a little more every time the token changes wallets, mimicking generational loss in analog media. He has since released Volume 2 series including Caves and Noumenon, plus projects such as Chronophotograph, Hashmarks and Payphone, and brought his blacksmithing practice into the work with Sketches in Iron on Feral File. His deliberately minimal toolset is a durability argument: work built this way should still run decades from now. He has discussed the practice in venues including LACMA's Unframed.

Fully on-chain generative audiovisual art written in low level C, with both audio and visuals synthesized from code and a mint-time hash stored on Ethereum. Series include Synth Poems, Angular, Transmission, Entropy, Glitchbox, Advection, Caves and Noumenon. He also forges physical iron work, shown in Sketches in Iron on Feral File.

• Synth Poems (Series 0, 128 pieces)
• Entropy (Series 3), tokens that degrade with each transfer
• Glitchbox and Advection
• Volume 2: Caves and Noumenon
• Sketches in Iron on Feral File
• Pioneering the minimal C-compiler-and-Ethereum toolchain

On the show