Tezos x Art Basel 2022 Interview: Generative Artist Leander Herzog
The generative artist and web developer explains how Web3 and Tezos have transformed his art.
350 words, 2 minute read
Leander Herzog is a generative artist and web developer, whose Web3 journey started when he started putting work onto seminal Tezos NFT platform Hic et Nunc, and continues today on objkt, fxhash and Teia.art.
The Blokhaus team caught up with Herzog over the summer, at the Art Basel show in Basel, in Herzog’s native Switzerland. You’ll find extracts from his interview below, and the full video is available to watch at the top of this page.
On the difference that Web3 has made to Herzog’s creative practice:
What blockchain has changed for me in my work is that really there is a market now, and […] it’s established. I don’t have to explain it. […] I’ve been doing generative art for a long time, and I would always explain people, ‘Look, I write code. That code makes images. I can make many, many images and it’s super cool’ - and people will stare at me and be like ‘So what?’ And it really didn’t make much sense, and it was like there was a gap. People just didn’t really get it.
How Tezos has brought generative art, and artists, into public consciousness:
[…] These days it’s perfectly clear. People love generative art. I don’t have to explain what I do. It’s really, everything is about the art now and not about the method or the platform or the marketplace, because that is just there and it just works. Generative art was established before, but only in a very, very niche audience, I would say. […] We are all connected via the internet now, so it’s really going crazy.
[…] I can work with people I’ve known for years and just didn’t have the opportunity because the pre-existing institutions, frameworks, practices didn’t allow for that, and now we can make it happen. Yes, it was almost impossible before that. I sold here and there, but never enough to make a living. It’s incredible. It’s so exciting. I’m so grateful. It’s completely surreal.