# Bloom by Blockchance

## The work and its context

Bloom is a 285-edition Art Blocks Factory series by Blockchance on the V2 core contract `0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270`. The official collection page places it in Art Blocks 500 / Factory and prints a fixed edition of 285 unique artworks.[^S01] Indexed project metadata retrieved on 18 September 2026 records project ID 168, slug `bloom-by-blockchance`, script type `js@na`, license `CC BY-SA`, vertical name factory, heritage status ab500, website https://blockchance.io, and 285 of 285 invocations.[^S02] Atlas position 169 is an index number, not the contract project ID.

The stored project description calls Bloom a story about a flower and its life cycle. Each leaf and petal's shape, location, and variations are generated from the token hash. "Over a period of time determined by the hash (weeks, months, even years), each element of the flower will break away and float to the floor, ultimately becoming a pile of leaves and petals." The text names Memento Mori and then prints a Dutch-auction schedule: starting at 2 ETH and decreasing every five minutes to 0.25 ETH along the steps 2, 1, 0.75, 0.5, 0.4, 0.35, 0.3, 0.25. It adds that 25 percent of sales over base price will be donated to charities listed on the studio website.[^S01][^S02]

Blockchance's official website field is https://blockchance.io.[^S02][^S05] The AB5D dossier is a bibliography lead.[^S08] This essay uses the on-chain description, the indexed script, and inspected outputs.

## Conception and development

No dated standalone interview unique to Bloom was attached to the assignment snapshot. The conception document that can be pinned to this slug is the project description stored on the collection page and in `projects_metadata.description`.[^S01][^S02] That text binds three claims: a hash-built flower, a hash-timed decay toward a pile, and a memento mori moral. The decay interval is described as weeks, months, even years. It is not a frame count.

The same paragraph publishes a primary-sale schedule. That schedule is an announced Dutch auction on the project text, not a recovered per-token receipt. "Base price" in the charity sentence is not defined beyond the 0.25 ETH floor implied by the step list. Whether 25 percent of the amount above 0.25 ETH was paid, and to which listed charities, is not receipted here.[^S01][^S05]

The studio site at blockchance.io is the official website recorded on the project. It supplies artist and charity-list context. It does not replace the Art Blocks description as the dated brief for Bloom.[^S05] Later AB5D prose that restates the life-cycle metaphor is treated as secondary.[^S08]

Published token features include Filter, Bouquet, Opacity, Shading, Clipping, Inverted, Last Drop, Background, Flower 1 Color, Number of Leaves, and Number of Petals. Last Drop values in this sample are large millisecond timestamps (for example 1687516096320 on edition 0), which is consistent with a scheduled future drop rather than a simple boolean.[^S03] Those timestamps were not converted into calendar predictions for this essay without checking timezone and whether the unit is Unix milliseconds.


## How the work was constructed

The indexed record reports script type and version `js@na`.[^S02] The full script was retrieved on 18 September 2026 from `projects_metadata.script` on `https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql`, filtered by contract `0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270` and project_id `"168"`. The UTF-8 payload is 14339 bytes. SHA-256 of those exact bytes is `47460bda2c1ae0329414ec2b726dd2e22669d5131aba724318d41ef7c1262317`. The script was read in full and was not executed in a local sandbox.[^S03]

The body is minified raw JavaScript. It uses `requestAnimationFrame` and a WEBGL path, and it contains a click handler. There is no p5 `draw` or `noLoop()`. Time-based decay described in the project text is consistent with comparing wall-clock or date now against hash-derived drop times inside that animation frame. This essay does not treat a media-proxy PNG as a live measurement of how many petals have fallen since mint.[^S01][^S03]

No Tone.js or Web Audio API appears in the inspected bytes. What is stored on chain is the project script plus each token hash. Rendering still requires a browser and the generator shell that injects `tokenData`. The project record marks the script locked. No Ethereum block was pinned.[^S02]

## The mint

Several clocks have to be kept apart. Token 168000000, invocation 0, was minted on 24 September 2021 at 19:46:19.[^S03] The project record's `activated_at` is 4 October 2021 at 23:00:59. `start_datetime` is 5 October 2021 at 16:00:00.[^S02] Invocation 1 (token 168000001) was minted on 5 October 2021 at 16:01:38, ninety-eight seconds after start. Invocations 10, 20 and 23 followed at 16:27:46, 16:33:51 and 16:34:58 the same day. `completed_at` is 2 April 2024 at 01:28:35.[^S02][^S03]

Invocation 0 therefore predates activation by ten days and public start by eleven. It is the natural candidate for an artist or administrative mint; contract event logs that would prove the minter role were not pulled. Public minting evidence in this sample begins with invocation 1, just after start. From start to `completed_at` is 909 days, 9 hours, 28 minutes. That is not a same-day Factory snap sale. A 285-edition cap that takes until April 2024 to fill is an indexed fact, not an explanation.

Invocations and max_invocations both read 285 on 18 September 2026.[^S02] The collection page confirms the completed fixed edition.[^S01] The Dutch schedule printed in the project description (2 ETH start, 0.25 ETH floor, five-minute steps) is an announced primary-sale apparatus. Individual paid prices were not recovered from receipts.[^S01][^S07]

## Copyright and licensing

The project metadata field `license` is the exact string `CC BY-SA`. No version number and no separate `link_to_license` field were stored on the indexed record inspected for this essay.[^S02] Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike deeds exist in more than one version. The 4.0 deed at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ is the current international text inspected for this label, but the stored string does not say 4.0.[^S06] That version gap is recorded rather than resolved by picking the most convenient deed.

Artwork rights are separate from source-code rights. The artist script is visible through the index and generator. Visibility is not a license to copy or reissue the program. No SPDX header was present in the inspected body.[^S03] The runtime is raw browser JavaScript plus WEBGL; those dependencies are not relicensed by the artwork label.[^S02]

AB5D's CC0 grant covers this essay's original prose only. Token ownership does not transfer copyright in the images. The charity sentence is a sales allocation claim, not a change to the artwork licence.[^S01]

## Close reading of examples

Four tokens from the assignment discovery set were confirmed on the V2 contract and inspected as media-proxy PNGs with linked generator URLs: invocations 0, 1, 10 and 20. Invocation 23, owned by `0xdd19308a9731cdecb67e0d80ca6823394208c045` on 18 September 2026, is the header object.[^S03][^S04][^S09] Live decay was not stopwatch-timed. PNGs are single moments of a time-aware renderer.

Edition 0 (token 168000000) carries Background=Eggplant, Flower 1 Color=Fire, Number of Leaves=13, Number of Petals=26, Last Drop=1687516096320. The PNG inspected on 18 September 2026 is almost empty: a deep purple field with a small heap of translucent red, orange, and lime polygons at the bottom right. The flower as a standing plant is gone. That still is consistent with a completed fall, not with a bloom at mint. It is a 2026 capture of a 2021 token, which is exactly the kind of change the brief describes.[^S03][^S10]

Edition 1 (token 168000001) is Background=Charcoal, Flower 1 Color=Tangerine, Leaves=9, Petals=25, Last Drop=1889499839040. The PNG still shows floating clusters: an orange-red mass at upper left and green fragments to the right and bottom, on a dark navy field. More of the plant remains in frame than on edition 0. The later Last Drop timestamp is consistent with a longer scheduled life, but that reading is inference from the feature unit, not a calendar conversion performed here.[^S03][^S10]

Edition 10 is Background=Sea, Flower 1 Color=Lavender, Leaves=10, Petals=41. Edition 20 is Peach / Crisp Orange / 17 leaves / 42 petals. Header edition 23 is Sea / Easter / 16 leaves / 28 petals / Opacity=High / Shading=None. All five tokens exist on the stated contract. Their PNGs are sparse colored polygons on flat grounds, not botanical illustrations.[^S03][^S10]

Canonical token URLs use the chain/contract/id pattern. Displayed edition numbers are invocations.

## Significance and limitations

Bloom is a locked Factory edition that sells a flower whose hash also schedules its falling-apart. The stored brief says so, prints a Dutch schedule, and names memento mori.[^S01] The 2026 still of edition 0 is already a pile. The 909-day path from public start to `completed_at` is a pair of indexed clocks, not a reconstructed reason for why 285 tokens took until April 2024.[^S02][^S03]

Limits of this account are specific. Live decay was not timed. Invocation 0's minter role was not read from logs. Individual Dutch prices were not recovered.[^S07] Last Drop timestamps were not converted to dated predictions. The CC BY-SA label has no version in the project field.[^S02][^S06] Before publication, the coordinator refreshed the complete three-wallet AB5D linked-account set and checked the chosen token owner against it. The owner matched. The exact requests, returned identity and observation time are retained in the evidence record, separately from the earlier research snapshot. This is current indexed ownership evidence; it does not establish the acquisition date or historical custody of the work.[^S02][^S09]

Unresolved questions
- What ETH price did each sampled token pay under the printed Dutch steps?
- Who minted token 168000000 on 24 September 2021, and under what project role?
- When, in local time, is Last Drop 1687516096320, and had edition 0 already finished falling by the 2026 PNG?
- Which charities received 25 percent of the amount over base, and what was base?
- Why did the 285th invocation wait until 2 April 2024?

[^S01]: Art Blocks. [Bloom by Blockchance](https://www.artblocks.io/collection/bloom-by-blockchance). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S02]: Art Blocks. [projects_metadata for project 168 on V2 core](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S03]: Art Blocks. [tokens_metadata and projects_metadata.script for project 168](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S04]: Art Blocks. [Bloom #0 token page](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/168000000). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S05]: Blockchance. [Blockchance studio site](https://blockchance.io). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S06]: Creative Commons. [Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S07]: Art Blocks. [Bloom project page](https://www.artblocks.io/project/168). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S08]: AB5D. [Blockchance artist dossier](https://ab5d.xyz/artists/blockchance/). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S09]: Art Blocks. [Bloom #23 token page](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/168000023). Accessed 2026-09-18.
[^S10]: Art Blocks. [Media-proxy PNGs for Bloom sample tokens](https://media-proxy.artblocks.io/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/168000000.png). Accessed 2026-09-18.