# Labyrometry by Eliya Stein

## A room made from competing layers

Labyrometry by Eliya Stein presents geometric forms through a haze of overlapping marks. Rounded or angular square outlines can resemble frames, doors or passages; triangles interrupt them with sharp directional edges. Some shapes stand clearly in front, while others appear submerged. The image offers several suggestions of depth without settling into a single coherent perspective.[^S07][^S09]

The artist describes each invocation as an imaginary room within an abstract maze-like building. Fog, shadows and framing establish that proposition.[^S01] The actual drawing is two-dimensional: its uncertain space comes from layered strokes, transparency and offset copies of shapes. The room exists through visual inference rather than a navigable architectural model.

Labyrometry comprises 800 minted works in Art Blocks' Factory programme. The official collection page dates its release to August 9, 2021. Its exact identity is Ethereum project 127 on contract `0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270`.[^S01][^S02] The [AB5D artist dossier](https://ab5d.xyz/artists/eliya-stein/) documents Stein's wider practice. Here, the significant encounter is between the apparent clarity of geometry and a surface that continually makes its relationships ambiguous, even after the drawing has stopped.

## An invitation without a fixed route

The artist's published statement imagines a viewer stepping into a sequence of rooms. That framing gives the squares and triangles an architectural charge without specifying what they represent. A rounded square might be an opening, a rail or a floating object. Its shadow suggests separation from another surface, but the surrounding haze prevents that surface from being securely located.[^S01]

There is no maze-solving procedure in the inspected generator. The title's labyrinth is produced by overlapping boundaries, interrupted shapes and uncertain depth. This distinction matters because a viewer can search for a path without the work supplying a correct route. Its geometry organises attention while withholding a usable floor plan.[^S02]

Stein's later Prismatic project, released in November 2021, explicitly describes still images that transform in response to keystrokes.[^S03] That statement provides a useful comparison with Labyrometry's less overt keyboard behaviour. Both allow a settled image to be only one condition of executable code. The later description does not prove a direct development sequence, however, and no fuller first-person account of Labyrometry's making was located.

The initial image remains substantial on its own. Its shapes carry traces of the order in which they were drawn: an earlier contour may be veiled, while a later outline crosses it sharply. The composition can therefore suggest both a place and an accumulation of painting decisions. These are interpretations grounded in the visible layers, rather than claims that the artist modelled a particular building or physical painting process.

## Fog without a fog engine

The complete artist script contains 4,975 characters and runs with p5.js 1.0.0. It was retrieved from the official Art Blocks index with the exact project identity and read from the hash setup through every drawing function and the final keyboard handler. This is indexed source inspection, not a direct block-pinned retrieval from Ethereum.[^S02]

The hash controls the work in two ways. Four successive eight-digit hexadecimal portions initialise a four-word bitwise pseudorandom generator, using the first 128 hash bits. Separately, the parity of individual hash characters supplies flags that switch features on and off. The generator selects values such as palette, locations, dimensions and transparency; the flags govern options including background marks, rounding, framing and additional shapes.[^S02]

Seven named palettes range from citrus and pastel combinations to saturated brights and alternating black and white. The canvas is square, sized from the smaller initial window dimension. Setup fills it with the palette's first colour and performs nine background passes. Depending on the flags, those passes can draw paired Bézier curves, curves with circles, or triangles. Nested loops distribute many translucent strokes across the field.[^S02]

The fog is this accumulation of marks. It is not a simulated atmosphere, a downloaded texture or a noise-generated cloud. Repeated strokes overlap at low opacity, making individual curves difficult to follow while retaining their directional pull. Their density can partly cover forms already on the canvas, so a background routine also acts as a veil when called later.[^S02]

The main drawing phase lasts for a selected two, three or four frames. Each frame adds another background pass and outlined squares. Earlier frames also add triangles, sometimes several; the final frame omits that triangle routine. The call to `noLoop()` stops subsequent frames but does not abandon the rest of the current drawing function. This is a finite construction process that resolves into a still image, not a continuous animation.[^S02]

Depth comes from modest offsets. The square routine draws a black copy slightly down and right before the coloured outline. The triangle routine similarly pairs black and coloured versions and adds a fine edge. These copies behave like shadows without any calculated light source. Rounded corners and line joins soften some shapes, while other outputs keep hard angles. A broad border or a thin enclosing frame then provides a more definite limit around the uncertain internal space.[^S02]

There is also a deliberately concealed interaction. The keyboard handler accumulates typed characters and recognises `abrulez`. After that sequence, non-S keys choose another palette and resume drawing; B selects black and white. The generator is not reseeded and the canvas is not cleared, so the result builds on the existing image rather than simply recolouring every previous shape. S invokes PNG saving, which was inspected in code but not tested.[^S02]

On the original #416 renderer, entering the sequence added new pastel layers and a large green frame; B then added monochrome marks while traces of earlier colour remained. Reloading restored the original composition.[^S11] The other sampled images remained unchanged between observations after loading. The transient initial build was not timed. No mouse or audio functions appear in the script, and listening was not independently monitored. No resize handler was found.

## An August 1 token before an August 9 release

The first indexed token, #0, was minted on August 1, 2021 at 00:29:47+00:00. Activation is recorded on August 2 at 14:55:11+00:00. The official collection page reports August 9 as the release date.[^S02][^S01] These records describe different events and should not be compressed into a single launch timestamp.

Token #1 was minted on August 9 at 13:22:37+00:00, also the indexed start timestamp. The sampled #10 followed at 13:25:17 and #20 at 13:26:27. The final invocation, #799, was minted at 13:42:15, matching completion. The interval from #1 to #799 is 1,178 seconds, or nineteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds. It is a calculation between indexed mint records, not a verified public sale duration: the precise opening and any allocation arrangements remain unresolved.[^S02]

Current invocation count and maximum both equal 800. The current indexed price is 0.07 ETH. A dated source establishing the originally announced cap, mint price and sale mechanism was not located, so those historical terms cannot be inferred from the present fields. The gap is particularly relevant to #0, whose creation precedes both activation and the stated release. Its early timestamp alone does not identify whether it was an artist allocation, a test, a purchase or another permitted mint.

## Noncommercial reuse and separate software terms

The reported artwork licence is exactly CC BY-NC 4.0. Although its indexed link field is empty, the named variant and version identify the inspected Creative Commons terms.[^S02][^S04] These permit noncommercial sharing and adaptation with conditions including attribution, a licence reference and identification of changes. They do not transfer copyright, authorise unrestricted commercial use or imply the artist's endorsement. Their grant covers rights the licensor is entitled to license.

The complete artist script contains no separate software licence notice. The scope of the artwork label over independent source-code reuse is therefore not explicit. The p5.js 1.0.0 distribution includes the GNU Lesser General Public License 2.1, whose conditions concern copying, modifying and distributing the library.[^S05] That dependency's terms do not automatically settle the status of Stein's whole script. The original prose of this essay is CC0, while the artwork remains under its reported noncommercial licence and the dependency retains its software terms.

## Frames that fail to contain the room

The five inspected works are on Ethereum contract `0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270`: #0 (`127000000`), #1 (`127000001`), #10 (`127000010`), #20 (`127000020`) and #416 (`127000416`). Exact token records and canonical pages were verified before viewing their original renderers. This early-token sample compares palette, framing and corner treatment; #416 adds a fresh AB5D holding. It is not an exhaustive account of the edition's variation.[^S02]

In #0, a thick green rounded square stands in front of a field of green, pink and yellow strokes. A black offset beneath it makes the outline seem raised. Further contours are visible behind and beside it, including a shape cut off at the right edge. The broad green border and thin magenta inner frame give the composition an emphatic exterior limit.[^S07]

That limit does not settle the internal space. The foreground square resembles an opening, but the same streaked colour continues through and around it. Looking through it does not reveal a separate room. Instead, the viewer alternates between reading a solid raised outline and reading a flat coloured mark. The forms cropped by the edge suggest continuation beyond the visible area, while the surrounding border insists that the picture is complete. This tension gives the otherwise simple geometry an unsettled spatial character.

Token #10 makes a more severe construction in black, white and grey. Heavy angular outlines overlap a thinner white perimeter. A long pale triangle descends towards the lower right, its face crossed by translucent marks. A dark triangular area lies to the left, and several square edges recede beneath the haze.[^S09]

The absence of hue shifts attention towards opacity and ordering. The pale triangle looks prominent because of its brightness, yet the strokes passing across it connect it to the surrounding field. Meanwhile, a heavy black vertical edge can appear almost solid beside much fainter rectangles. The image suggests depth without allowing the viewer to assign every shape a consistent distance. Its most convincing passages are those where an apparently firm edge loses authority as it enters a denser region of marks.

In #1, muted teal, ochre and pink replace #0's sharp saturation. A large black rounded square carries a fine peach edge, with a second faint contour just inside it and a small triangle protruding near the lower right. Its broad dark exterior border makes the composition feel more enclosed.[^S08] Token #20 uses the monochrome palette again, but shifts the emphasis towards nested angular squares and a smaller pale diagonal triangle near the lower centre. Both initial compositions remained stable across repeated observations.[^S10]

The freshly fetched AB5D profile links three wallets, and #416's indexed owner matches one of them.[^S06][^S02] Its initial image combines rounded wire-like frames with a yellow triangle rising from the lower left towards the upper right, all embedded in vivid layered colour. Testing the keyboard sequence added new forms over that arrangement, and the subsequent black-and-white choice partly buried its colour. Reloading recovered the initial image. The original renderer therefore preserves something a preview cannot show: the settled room can become material for another drawing without changing the token itself.[^S11]

## The architecture of an unfinished reading

Labyrometry makes uncertainty out of familiar shapes. Squares, triangles, borders and offset shadows supply enough structure to evoke a room, but the repeated translucent marks prevent that room from resolving into a stable plan. Its geometry is not obscured completely; it remains clear enough to keep inviting another attempt to understand the space.

The keyboard behaviour extends that logic into the drawing process. A finished initial composition can receive further layers, turning previous forms into partially buried traces. The token's repeatable starting image and its optional continuation coexist. What remains distinctive is the relation between a sharp boundary and the material that passes across it, whether that boundary belongs to a shape, a frame or the stopping point of the program.

Unresolved research questions:

- What sketches or development account explain the relationship between the imaginary-room premise and the layering routines?
- How was the concealed keyboard sequence communicated to the first viewers, and how did Stein describe its role?
- What contemporaneous record establishes the original price, cap, public opening and allocation of #0?
- What separate permission, if any, applies to reuse of the artist's source code?

[^S01]: Eliya Stein and Art Blocks. [Labyrometry official collection and artist statement](https://www.artblocks.io/collection/labyrometry-by-eliya-stein). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S02]: Art Blocks. [Labyrometry project 127 and exact token records](https://artblocks-mainnet.hasura.app/v1/graphql). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S03]: Eliya Stein and Art Blocks. [Prismatic official artist statement](https://www.artblocks.io/collection/prismatic-by-eliya-stein). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S04]: Creative Commons. [CC BY-NC 4.0 legal code](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/legalcode.en). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S05]: Free Software Foundation. [p5.js 1.0.0 LGPL 2.1 licence](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/p5@1.0.0/license.txt). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S06]: Art Blocks. [AB5D profile linked wallets](https://www.artblocks.io/profile/ab5d). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S07]: Eliya Stein. [Labyrometry #0](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/127000000). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S08]: Eliya Stein. [Labyrometry #1](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/127000001). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S09]: Eliya Stein. [Labyrometry #10](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/127000010). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S10]: Eliya Stein. [Labyrometry #20](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/127000020). Accessed 2026-09-17.
[^S11]: Eliya Stein. [Labyrometry #416](https://www.artblocks.io/token/1/0xa7d8d9ef8d8ce8992df33d8b8cf4aebabd5bd270/127000416). Accessed 2026-09-17.