# Human Unreadable by Operator

## The work and its context

Human Unreadable is project 455 on the Art Blocks V2 core contract 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069, published under the canonical slug human-unreadable-by-operator and credited to Operator. The indexed project record reports a completed edition of 400 of 400 invocations, runtime p5@1.0.0, and the official description: **Human Unreadable (Privacy Collection - Lot 03)**  **Human Unreadable** is a three-act, embodied generative artwork hiding the human body in plain sight (on-chain). Bringing together choreography, code, blockchain, generative art, and cryptography, the work culminates in a live performance. Each output is driven by the motion data of its underlying unique, on-chain choreographic sequence. The sequences behind the first 100 minted works (mint #2 to #101) will be performed during the IRL premiere. The hosting art institution will be announced in 2023.   A journey of slowly recovering the human unfolds as such: 1) reveal on Art Blocks, 2) uncover the choreographic score, and 3) final performance. After the reveal, the human is still unreadable, visible only through the results of movement on glass, obfuscated by code, rendered as a still image. In the next phase of the work, collectors get a glimpse at their underlying choreography by unlocking the secondary token, an on-chain choreographic score. In the final phase, the performance, life is breathed into the human movement that has been lying dormant inside the pieces. **Human Unreadable** brings flesh and viscerality into code and "vulnerability as a feature" into long-form generative art. What you don’t immediately see in the visual artwork outputs is the invisible potentiality of performance, inscripted on-chain and able to be brought to life by a dancer at any moment.    **Human Unreadable** intentionally punctures the safety of modernist design and the idea of a universal voice, pushing the limits of human expression within rigid technical systems. With a focus on the body, the collection brings risk, chaos, confusion, and vulnerability to the reveal, everything that function-focused design systems normally prevent. Each piece is an invitation, a transparent layer through which the messy human experience can come into focus through the three phases of the work. This work is a continuation of the pivot away from modernism, clean lines, and the quietly gendered values therein, in favor of a more embodied and sensual approach to human-machine collaboration pioneered by early women in digital art. **Human Unreadable**'s 6 distinct looks derive from the core materiality of Operator’s Privacy Collection: glass, light, x-ray and the human body. The transparent and illuminating nature of these materials reveal what is below the surface.  What are you revealing when you reveal?  **Human Unreadable** has roots in various histories such as computational choreography (Analivia Cordeiro, Jeanne Beaman), Merce Cunningham's Chance Dance, and the Experiments in Art and Technology movement. With Ti’s extensive background as an HCI technologist and multimedia artist and Catherine’s background as a choreographer and performance artist, Operator architected a bespoke team, 25+ individuals ranging from specialized engineers to dancers, who embarked on a 9 month process to realize the work. Operator's on-chain generative choreography method is the technical backbone of **Human Unreadable**, the process and open source tooling for which will be made available via white paper in 2023.     ***Additional Information***  **First Minter Benefits**  The first 100 minted pieces (mint #2 to #101) from the collection will be performed in the IRL premiere in an art institution.  -Mint #2 to #101 will be counted as the first 100 mints. Mint #0 and #1 are artist mints held by Operator. -Hosting art institution will be announced in 2023.  -Additionally, Privacy Key 00 holders will have one of their collected Human Unreadable sequences performed.  **Choreographic Score (secondary token)**  -The secondary token will be released at the end of June 2023. -The secondary token is a choreographic score that represents the unique choreography that generated the output minted on Art Blocks. For this reason, the Art Blocks token and the secondary token are bound together and cannot be transferred separately. -The underlying choreographic score visible through the secondary token can be performed by a choreographer or dancer at the collector's discretion.  **GPU Intensive Rendering / Live Preview**  This piece involves GPU intensive composition and rendering of programmatically drawn body parts, generative glass objects, x-ray shaders as well as motion paths. As a result the ‘live preview’ on your laptop or phone may look less detailed than the PNG on Art Blocks which is rendered by a high powered computer. Not to worry!  **Official Token-gated Prints**  Human Unreadable collectors will be able to purchase Operator official, signed, token-gated prints (on hand-selected materials) of their collected piece(s). [^S01][^S02]

Those figures are current index observations retrieved on 2026-09-19, not a reconstruction of the original public sale announcement. Atlas position is a catalogue ordinal and is not the on-chain project ID. The live collection page and the Hasura projects_metadata row agree on title, slug, contract, and project ID after a filtered query that used the exact slug. [^S01][^S02]

Contract 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069. Aspect ratio indexed as 0.75. Website http://operator.la/human-unreadable.

This essay treats the stored artist program, four independently identified outputs, and a freshly checked AB5D holding (or an explicit collection gap) as primary evidence. Metadata traits are cited only when they were returned for the same V2 contract token IDs that were visually inspected. They do not replace looking at the pictures. [^S04][^S09]

## Conception and development

The official project description is the development account used here. Interview or dossier sentences that name a different slug are not treated as statements about this series. **Human Unreadable (Privacy Collection - Lot 03)**  **Human Unreadable** is a three-act, embodied generative artwork hiding the human body in plain sight (on-chain). Bringing together choreography, code, blockchain, generative art, and cryptography, the work culminates in a live performance. Each output is driven by the motion data of its underlying unique, on-chain choreographic sequence. The seq

The development account used here is the specific source named in the citations, not a paraphrase of an artist-dossier page. Where that account is an official project description written in the artist's voice, that limit is stated rather than upgraded into an unpublished studio diary. Where an interview exists, the sentences that actually name Human Unreadable are the ones relied on. [^S07][^S01]

Secondary pages that only repeat the marketplace listing are not treated as independent conception sources. [^S02][^S07]

## How the work was constructed

The complete artist program for slug human-unreadable-by-operator was retrieved from projects_metadata.script filtered by that exact slug. The UTF-8 payload is 302730 bytes with SHA-256 1e3a1e2073962a11378b6c339842aabedb1be6cfaf2fec7abb77625fa00b1cee. Runtime on the project record is p5@1.0.0. The script was read in full; it was not executed in this research session. [^S03]

The stored generator is 302730 bytes, SHA-256 1e3a1e2073962a11378b6c339842aabedb1be6cfaf2fec7abb77625fa00b1cee, runtime p5@1.0.0. Detected source markers: setup, WEBGL, createCanvas, tokenData, hash. Named functions include setup, t. tokenData.hash is read in source. Output then follows the drawing path those functions implement. Token 0 observation: Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, mid-tone and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 146,145,145). File size 2268710 bytes. Indexed features: Pause No; Height 1.09; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.04; Rotation 0.42; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.08; Repetition 3

Visual claims come from inspected media-proxy PNGs plus indexed token features.

Seed handling is visible in the retrieved program: tokenData.hash is read in source. Time and interaction behaviour in code is: Loop behaviour inferred only from source keywords. The inspected PNG is a static frame. A handler found in source is not the same thing as a control that was pressed in a live renderer during this session; tested controls are listed only when an actual key or pointer action was performed. [^S03][^S10]

External dependencies are those declared by script_type_and_version plus any library identifiers inside the file. Public visibility of the stored script does not grant a right to redistribute the raw artist source in this package, so the analysis cites functions and byte length rather than reprinting the program. [^S03][^S06]

## The mint

Indexed chronology for project 455 on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069 is as follows. First token minted_at is 2023-05-12T22:52:35+00:00. activated_at is 2023-05-17T20:15:11+00:00. start_datetime is 2023-05-24T17:00:00+00:00. completed_at is 2023-05-24T17:31:23+00:00. Invocations stand at 400 of a maximum 400, with complete=true on the retrieved row. [^S02][^S04]

Calculated intervals from those timestamps: first mint to activation is 4.89 days; activation to start_datetime is 6.86 days; start_datetime to completion is 31.4 minutes; first mint to completion is 11.78 days. These are differences of indexed clock fields, not a claim about when a web storefront button became visible to every collector. A first mint that precedes start_datetime is treated as an early or reserved mint unless a separate allocation record is produced. [^S02][^S04]

Indexed clocks: first 2023-05-12T22:52:35+00:00, activated 2023-05-17T20:15:11+00:00, start 2023-05-24T17:00:00+00:00, completed 2023-05-24T17:31:23+00:00. Early first-mint timestamps are not labelled reserved without a separate allocation record.

Historic per-token ETH prices for the original public sale were not recovered from a primary price table during this session and remain unresolved. Any floor price visible on a marketplace page in 2026 is a current listing observation, not the 2021 ask. [^S01][^S02]

## Copyright and licensing

The project record stores the artwork licence label '© 2023 Operator LLC'. That label is not a Creative Commons version string and is recorded as a custom or unknown artwork term. Code rights for the artist program are not separately labelled on the same field; they are treated as unknown rather than assumed identical to the artwork deed. [^S02][^S06]

Artwork label copied exactly as '© 2023 Operator LLC'.

Third-party runtime p5@1.0.0 is a separate rights object from both the artwork outputs and the artist source. p5.js, three.js, and ordinary browser JavaScript each keep their own licence texts. This package does not redistribute those libraries. [^S03][^S06]

Original essay prose in this package is dedicated CC0-1.0 by the research operator. That dedication does not change the artwork, code, or dependency licences.

## Close reading of examples

Human Unreadable #0 is token 455000000 on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069, minted 2023-05-12T22:52:35+00:00. The canonical token page returned HTTP 200. The inspected media-proxy PNG is a static frame. Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, mid-tone and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 146,145,145). File size 2268710 bytes. Indexed features: Pause No; Height 1.09; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.04; Rotation 0.42; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.08; Repetition 3 Indexed features returned for this V2 token: Pause No; Height 1.09; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.04; Rotation 0.42; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.08; Repetition 3.  [^S04][^S05][^S09]

Human Unreadable #1 is token 455000001 on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069, minted 2023-05-12T22:54:59+00:00. The canonical token page returned HTTP 200. The inspected media-proxy PNG is a static frame. Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, light and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 191,191,190). File size 1174503 bytes. Indexed features: Pause No; Height 0.74; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.18; Rotation 0.22; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.09; Repetition 0 Indexed features returned for this V2 token: Pause No; Height 0.74; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.18; Rotation 0.22; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.09; Repetition 0.  [^S04][^S05][^S09]

Human Unreadable #10 is token 455000010 on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069, minted 2023-05-24T17:01:11+00:00. The canonical token page returned HTTP 200. The inspected media-proxy PNG is a static frame. Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, mid-tone and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 111,111,111). File size 1394185 bytes. Indexed features: Pause No; Height 1.12; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.1; Rotation 0.49; Slowness Less slow; Wingspan 1.27; Repetition 0 Indexed features returned for this V2 token: Pause No; Height 1.12; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.1; Rotation 0.49; Slowness Less slow; Wingspan 1.27; Repetition 0.  [^S04][^S05][^S09]

Human Unreadable #20 is token 455000020 on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069, minted 2023-05-24T17:07:47+00:00. The canonical token page returned HTTP 200. The inspected media-proxy PNG is a static frame. Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, mid-tone and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 113,113,112). File size 1418731 bytes. Indexed features: Pause No; Height 0.74; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.33; Rotation 0.74; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.23; Repetition 1 Indexed features returned for this V2 token: Pause No; Height 0.74; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.33; Rotation 0.74; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 1.23; Repetition 1.  [^S04][^S05][^S09]

The AB5D header candidate is token 455000263 (edition 263), currently indexed to 0xdd19308a9731cdecb67e0d80ca6823394208c045, which is one of the three linked addresses returned for username ab5d on 2026-09-19. That ownership match is a present-tense index observation, not proof of continuous custody since mint. Inspected media-proxy PNG is 1800x2400px, mid-tone and muted or near-neutral (mean RGB 86,86,86). File size 969153 bytes. Indexed features: Pause Yes; Height 1.05; Improv Absent; Erratic 0.02; Rotation 0.92; Slowness Slow; Wingspan 0.8; Repetition 4 [^S08][^S04][^S09]

Motion, interaction, and audio: Loop behaviour inferred only from source keywords. The inspected PNG is a static frame. The static PNGs document halt or preview states. They are not by themselves proof that a live loop is still running, nor proof that a work is silent. No soundtrack was heard from these pages during this session. [^S09][^S10][^S03]

## Significance and limitations

Human Unreadable is project 455 by Operator on 0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069. The close readings above are the evidence for what the stored program outputs.

Unresolved research questions that remain after this pass: (1) What was the exact public-sale unit price in ETH at start_datetime, supported by a contemporaneous primary source rather than a later floor? (2) For tokens whose live renderer was not stopwatch-timed, what is the measured wall-clock period of one full cycle or one completed progressive draw? (3) What contemporaneous primary source records the original public unit price in ETH? (4) Incomplete Control aside, do any of the three current AB5D wallets later acquire or dispose of the header token used above after 2026-09-19? [^S02][^S08][^S10]

This package is a draft for human review. Structural validation tests file shape, not the truth of seeing or of licence interpretation.

[^S01]: Art Blocks. [Human Unreadable by Operator collection page](https://www.artblocks.io/collection/human-unreadable-by-operator). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S02]: Art Blocks Hasura index. [projects_metadata record for human-unreadable-by-operator](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S03]: Operator. [Human Unreadable on-chain artist program](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S04]: Art Blocks Hasura index. [tokens_metadata for sampled Human Unreadable token IDs](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S05]: Art Blocks. [Canonical token pages for sampled Human Unreadable outputs](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069/455000000). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S06]: Art Blocks project record. [Reported artwork licence label © 2023 Operator LLC](https://www.artblocks.io/collection/human-unreadable-by-operator). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S07]: Operator. [Human Unreadable official description](https://www.artblocks.io/info/spectrum/conversation-operator-ania-catherine-dejha-ti-human-unreadable). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S08]: Art Blocks. [AB5D linked wallet set and profile index](https://www.artblocks.io/profile/ab5d). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S09]: Art Blocks media proxy. [Static PNG renders of sampled Human Unreadable tokens](https://media-proxy.artblocks.io/0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069/455000000.png). Accessed 2026-09-19.
[^S10]: Art Blocks. [Live generator renderer for Human Unreadable](https://generator.artblocks.io/0x99a9b7c1116f9ceeb1652de04d5969cce509b069/455000000). Accessed 2026-09-19.