send/receive #1812

send/receive is a conceptual artwork that celebrates the digital art community and the technology that connects us. It is a fully on-chain, highly participatory system in which every collector becomes a co-creator contributing their presence, energy, and intention to a network of interdependent artworks running on Ethereum.

Each artwork is alive to the global state of the network. Block by block, the balance between "sending" and "receiving" across all tokens determines what each piece displays. As collectors change their settings, the entire network shifts in real time.

Collectors begin by creating a 64×64 pixel character, a personal sprite, to represent themselves on the network. Optionally, they can compose a simple four-track audio tune to accompany their sprite. This can be done through the Art Blocks interface, which records and submits the creation directly to the blockchain, or through the fully on-chain editors embedded in the artwork itself, allowing collectors to generate a data string and manually update their token via Etherscan.

By default, each token starts in a neutral state. If a sprite has been added, the artwork displays it as a static image. From there, collectors choose how they want to participate: send, receive, or both.

These choices shape the global system. When more tokens are sending, the receiving tokens display incoming sprites more rapidly. When more tokens choose to receive, the senders are distributed across the network at a slower pace. Each token expresses its role visually:

• Receive mode: a continuous flow of incoming sprites, presented in one of four styles assigned at mint (grid, column, fall, or bounce).
• Send mode: your sprite remains centered, occasionally pulsing outward as it broadcasts.
• Send + Receive: your token displays its receive style with a subtle pulsing border to indicate that it is also sending.

Collectors are invited to adjust their token's setting as their mood changes to give, to take, or to hold both impulses at once. The more you take, the less others receive. The less you take, the more others receive. The system reflects these choices instantly, on-chain, creating an ever-shifting portrait of community intention.

The project was inspired by how people in our community often say "sending thoughts and prayers" to express support, or "send your thoughts and prayers" when they need encouragement. As someone who is not religious, I wanted to explore the underlying sentiment without invoking prayer directly to create a way for us to express care, attention, and presence through the medium of networked art.

Empathy is the foundation of this work. In a world that increasingly questions its value, I believe empathy is essential not only for navigating our digital lives, but for understanding each other at all. Taking a moment to step into someone else's shoes can illuminate motivations, reduce friction, and help us meet each other with generosity. send/receive is an experiment in using on-chain art to make that exchange visible, felt, and shared.