Jason Ting

Artist

Jason Ting · site ↗

Based

New Haven, Connecticut (b. Johor Bahru, Malaysia)

Raster

raster.art/artist/jason-ting ↗

In the set

Transitions (4,712 editions) · Bubble Blobby (500) · Glow (500) · Worlds Within (256) · Light Beams (150)

Links

Full bibliography ↗

Jason Ting creates abstract animated visuals through precise generative systems. His work centers on the interplay of form, color, and motion, drawing from natural forces such as waves, light at dusk, and geometric order.¹ After more than a decade as a software engineer, Ting returned to creative coding in 2020. He builds daily sketches that evolve into larger bodies of work, often realized as long-form generative collections on Art Blocks.² The five projects gathered in the AB[500] trace a coherent arc: monumental collaboration, intimate studies of volume and glow, recursive structures, and directional light. Together they position Ting among the artists who treat code as a medium for perceptual and meditative experience.

Background and method

Ting was born in 1986 in Johor Bahru, Malaysia, and is based in New Haven, Connecticut. He graduated from the University of California, San Diego Interdisciplinary Computing and the Arts program. Early professional experience in frontend engineering gave him fluency in real-time graphics pipelines and shader logic. When he resumed artistic practice he adopted tools associated with the creative coding community, including p5.js, canvas-sketch, GLSL, and TouchDesigner. These instruments allow rapid iteration between sketch and finished system.¹

His stated influences include the light environments of James Turrell and Dan Flavin, the immersive installations of teamLab, and the algorithmic pioneers Vera Molnár and John Whitney. Yet the resulting works remain resolutely contemporary: they are screen-native, interactive where appropriate, and distributed as editioned tokens whose parameters are fixed at mint. Ting has exhibited video and light installations in institutional and gallery contexts, including Artspace New Haven and group presentations tied to Art Blocks Marfa events.² The AB[500] projects, however, represent the core of his on-chain generative output to date.

Transitions: scale and collaboration

Transitions, released in July 2021, remains Ting's largest and most widely recognized project. Created in collaboration with Matt Bilfield, the collection comprises 4,712 unique editions. The work translates the material logic of Bilfield's peg constructions into a fully generative, screen-based register. Pixels that once described physical assemblies now morph, rotate, and reconfigure without the constraints of wood, paint, or glue.³ Round and square formats, multiple color palettes, four distinct styles, variable depth, animation modes, and lighting conditions ensure that each output occupies its own point in a broad possibility space.

Series outputs · live on Art Blocks ↗

The sheer edition count and the interactive mouse-driven exploration of each piece mark Transitions as a landmark early Art Blocks release. It demonstrated that long-form generative work could sustain both visual variety and conceptual coherence at scale. The project also established Ting's reputation for precise control of color temperature, spatial depth, and subtle animation that rewards prolonged viewing.⁴

Bubble Blobby: volume, play, and surface

Bubble Blobby, limited to 500 editions, shifts focus to rounded, buoyant forms that suggest liquid or cellular structures. Color gradients and surface highlights create an illusion of translucency and internal volume. The works feel simultaneously microscopic and cosmic: clusters of orbs hover, overlap, and softly deform. Ting's treatment of edge and highlight gives each composition a tactile quality rare in purely generative output. The project rewards close inspection of how light appears to wrap around and pass through the blobby masses.⁵

Glow: light as primary material

Glow, also 500 editions, treats light itself as the central subject. Luminous fields, soft halos, and radiant cores dominate the compositions. Rather than depicting objects that emit light, the works often present light as atmosphere or substance. Subtle particle systems and gradient overlays produce a sense of depth without hard geometry. The project aligns with Ting's stated interest in the emotional registers of light: calm, mysterious, or quietly ecstatic. It extends the perceptual concerns of Transitions into a more atmospheric register.⁶

Worlds Within: recursion and interiority

Worlds Within (256 editions) explores nested and recursive structures. Frames within frames, or forms that contain smaller iterations of themselves, create a sense of infinite regress or protected interior spaces. The limited edition size corresponds to a more concentrated investigation: each output feels like a self-contained cosmos. Color choices often reinforce the theme of depth, moving from warm foregrounds to cool, distant backgrounds. The project demonstrates Ting's ability to use strict generative rules to produce works that feel contemplative rather than decorative.⁷

Light Beams: direction, volume, and edge

Light Beams (150 editions) returns to directional light as a structuring principle. Sharp or diffused beams cut through dark or graded fields, creating volumetric illusions and strong figure-ground relationships. The smaller edition count allowed for a tighter parameter space focused on angle, intensity, and interaction with subtle particle or fog layers. The works evoke both natural phenomena (sunbeams through atmosphere) and constructed light environments. They close the AB[500] sequence with a clear statement of Ting's core preoccupation: light not merely as illumination but as the primary agent of form and feeling.⁸

Position in the field

Ting's AB[500] projects sit at the intersection of several currents in contemporary generative art: the long-form collection model pioneered on Art Blocks, the renewed interest in light as both subject and medium, and a commitment to daily studio practice that yields coherent bodies of work rather than one-off experiments. His background in engineering and his explicit engagement with historical light artists distinguish him from purely formalist coders. The works reward both rapid scanning on social platforms and sustained, close viewing on high-resolution screens or in installation contexts. They offer viewers a meditative space in which algorithmic precision and organic suggestion coexist.²

Across the five projects the viewer encounters a consistent sensibility: careful calibration of color temperature, sensitivity to edge and transparency, and an understanding that motion, even when subtle, transforms static composition into lived perceptual time. Transitions established scale and collaborative reach. Bubble Blobby and Glow explored volume and atmosphere. Worlds Within turned inward to recursive depth. Light Beams articulated direction and edge. Together they constitute a significant contribution to the Art Blocks canon and to the broader field of code-based abstraction.

Bibliography

For the complete bibliography see the Jason Ting links page ↗.