Betha Sarasin’s SPIRALPROJEKT bridges the gap between early generative art and contemporary technology through the integration of blockchain technology. Begun in 1983, the multimedia project was further developed in 2024 as a web-based real-time audio-visual animation and is now on display at virtual.hek.ch.
Betha Sarasin (1930–2016) is known for her strikingly diverse body of work, which also includes computer-assisted works since 1978. Starting in 1983, the Basel-based artist worked with Zurich musician Markus Ganz and Horst Kordisch from the Fraunhofer Institute in Freiburg im Breisgau to develop a Fortran software for creating animated three-dimensional spirals. With the multimedia SPIRALPROJEKT, Sarasin wanted to give the cube an orderly spatial movement, to let it fly, so to speak, and capture infinity.
In 2023, the Betha and Teff Sarasin Foundation decided to revive the SPIRALPROJEKT using current technology and make it accessible to the public again. In 2024, it was fully realized as a web-based audiovisual real-time animation in P5.js. The project uses a generative system with up to 46 parameters and creates unique animated spirals with random colors and branches, synchronized with dynamic spatial music that is newly created for each spiral from 75 samples of the original 1983 soundtrack.
An open edition of NFTs was released in 2024, followed in 2025 by a curated edition by Kevin Abosch, Mario Klingemann, Susanne Päch, and Hans Dehlinger featuring plotter drawings. The entire project is now being reimagined as an interactive exhibition in HEK's browser-based exhibition space.
The exhibition opening will take place on September 18, 2025, at 7:00 p.m. at virtual.hek.ch.
Curators: Armin Blasbichler and Markus Ganz