The tapestries

Klangteppich will be woven in Norway, made from 100% wool. You can expect soft, textured tapestries elevating what you see on screen into another dimension. The size of the tapestries is ca. 66 × 106 cm (26 × 42’’).

The process of making a Klangteppich tapestry is manual and will thus take time. It won’t be an exact reproduction of the screen-based piece, rather an interpretation of it. Colors and patterns might differ from what you see on screen. Every frame of the digital pieces can be woven. The selection process will be done in a dialog between collector and artist.

The logistics of ordering your tapestry is done using redeemable tokens on fxhash. The physical is priced at 1000 tez excl. shipping and toll fees. Order your tapestry or get in touch if you have further questions!

About the piece

Klangteppich is a collection of 100 digital pieces, minted as a generative collection on fxhash. Each iteration has one out of four colour palettes, and one out of four musical variations that are randomly assigned at mint time. Both the music and the visuals are generative and will endlessly change over time.

The custom code of Klangteppich can produce different versions of the same piece in real time: front and back side, a preview of the weave pattern, and the instructions that can be sent directly to a TC-2 loom. You can still mint your iteration on fxhash.

Muralnomads
for the digital age

Klangteppich is loosely inspired by the textile works of Le Corbusier, and the thoughts behind them. Le Corbusier viewed tapestries as a means of bringing warmth into the supposedly cold interiors of modernist architecture. To him, these “Muralnomads” — murals you can easily carry with you — were the natural evolution of the mural, defining and enriching space wherever you are.

Klangteppich can be seen as a continuation of these thoughts in the digital age. We are living our lives on the go as never before, and spend a good share of our time in the digital realm. And still, we experience a need for haptic experiences, a need of belonging to the spaces we are in. Klangteppich, being rooted in the digital and physical worlds, is an animated, hyper-nomadic mural that fits this contemporary lifestyle and has the ability to define and enrich our surroundings both digitally and physically.

Weaving is computing

The series is deeply rooted in the historical interdependence of the loom and the computer. The jacquard loom was an important milestone on the path towards today’s computers. In turn, today’s digital jacquard looms are usually controlled by computers — including the one used to produce the physical Klangteppich series.

Departing from this idea, Klangteppich inseparably connects weaving and computing both visually and procedurally. Although the process of designing textiles is highly digital already, it still relies heavily on brain and hand of the weaver, who manually applies weave patterns that often have been used for hundreds of years to their digital creations. Klangteppich, in turn, allows the computer complete autonomy in this process.

Starting from the digital, the abstract shapes and pattern fills are generated inspired by traditional weave patterns, while maintaining a flat “computer” aesthetic. In the transition towards the physical, the algorithm takes the role of the weaver and assigns the final weave patterns to the visual output. Here, a blend of emergent, computer-generated and pre-defined, traditional weave patterns is used. From this blend, a plethora of unique textures emerges that underline the inherent physicality of computer and code. In that sense, Klangteppich opens a world that blurs the lines between weaving and computing.

Technical notes

Klangteppich works best with Chrome. It was tested on Chrome, Firefox, and Safari on macOS and iOS. Limited compatibility with Android, and plenty of uncertainty with Windows.

Please test the piece on your device before you collect! To hear the music on iOS, the device’s silent mode must be switched off. To use the URL params, attach them to the URL in live view on fxhash.