A Missive from the Artist Qubibi Around the Exhibition SOURCE

By Kazumasa Teshigawara

Qubibi, also known as Kazumasa Teshigawara, is one of the artists featured in the exhibition SOURCE, now on view on Feral File. Since qubibi was unable to participate in the talk series around this exhibitions, he asked if he could write something instead. Feral File sent him the below prompt, and qubibi responded in a letter, addressed to Feral File and to the curators and fellow artists in SOURCE.

We asked:

Qubibi, your work "Mimizu," now on show with the exhibition SOURCE, has been released continuously for years, all using the same code base. Can you talk about the importance of duration in your work? How does the element of time add to or enhance your sense of meaning-making and worldmaking?

Qubibi answered:

Dear All,

I recently had a special opportunity to exhibit my artwork "Mimizu Tree" next to Hans Dehlinger's "Yellow Tree" at the gallery Expanded.Art in Berlin. Hans, who is 83, has devoted an enormous amount of time to generative art. I presented my first generative artwork, "hello world," 13 years ago — a mere moment in time for Hans.

By the way, the question from Feral File gave me pause, and made me think deeply. 😅

The core code that I used in "Mimizu" is the same as the one in "hello world." One day, I became fascinated by the unintentional boundaries that emerged when I was playing with colors in Photoshop. While I was recreating those lines in code, a moving pattern appeared by chance. Nowadays, this has become so generalized that it's even used as an effect in tools under the name of Turing Patterns. However, at the time, it was a shock to me. The emotion born at that moment might have been a mix of awe and perhaps even jealousy towards this uncharted depiction. If "source" is understood to mean "origin," then the emotions that arose at that time could be considered the source of all of my generative art. As a result of my contemplation about how I could turn this depiction into an artwork, "hello world" was born in 2010.

Even if the theme for that work was "boundaries," it was a beginning rather than an end, just as the name of the piece suggests. The work "hello world" quickly consumed my time and continued to evolve over the years, branching into various depictions. Eventually, boundaries evolved into a collection of lines, and the artwork "Ongaku Mimizu" (music worm) was born in 2018. It was three years later that "Mimizu" was released as an NFT. Inspired by Jonas Mekas, who sold individual frames of his films as photographs, it was almost as if I decided to slice up "Ongaku Mimizu" and start the Mimizu Shop. Any leftovers go into Leftover. The storage is the Storeroom. The piece "wiwizn" was born by flipping "Mimizu" upside down; lately, a grainy texture has appeared in my artworks, and these were depicted with the death of "Mimizu" in mind. The cells that are bound together when alive will disintegrate upon its decease. Will they eventually become sand, or perhaps give rise to mushrooms?

It might seem contradictory to what I'm doing, though I don't necessarily aim for a sustained relationship with my artworks, nor do I believe that continuous attempts are crucial for the artworks themselves. It's just that my dialogue with this depiction simply isn't over yet.

I often have reasons but not ideals, and when it comes to motivations (and whether they even exist), the only way for me to figure them out is to walk backwards from the outcomes. Do you see now why the question gave me such pause? ;)

Sometimes I can't find anything "good" no matter what I look at. Some seasons I can't feel anything no matter what I see in the world. During such times, it's as if I'm submerged in a grayscale world, with all contrast faded away. It's like a pendulum that's lost its energy and can no longer sway in either direction. Of course, this applies when I look at "Mimizu" as well. For instance, no matter how long I look at over a million outputs of "Mimizu" in this state, I can't find even a single one that I think is good. The only thing I can be certain of is the traces of my past selves, which once judged them to be good. In other words, the released artworks serve as markers and signposts for me. I cling to those markers, only able to determine my direction by looking at a previous signpost and then the one before it, and continuing the walk. However, the very ability to do this may be because, in retrospect, a path —or merely time — has been created.

Congratulations on the opening of SOURCE. My heartfelt thanks to Operator, 0xDEAFBEEF, and Casey REAS for inviting my artwork. I am honored to join the participating artists for this occasion.

Wishing for a splendid exhibition.

Best regards,
qubibi - Kazumasa Teshigawara