M+ presents Asian premiere of Beeple: HUMAN ONE

Beeple: HUMAN ONE is a dynamically changing hybrid digital-and-physical artwork depicting the first human born within the metaverse, a 3D-virtual environment accessible only via the internet. The piece features a human figure named “traveller” who appears within a rotating box-like structure made up of four monolithic LED panels. The traveller dons an astronaut outfit and moves onward through an ever-changing virtual terrain. The M+ presentation will be the work’s debut display in Asia.

HUMAN ONE, designed as a continuous digital display that will grow over time, displays a continuing conversation in response to current events and represents the artist’s evolving interests throughout his life. As the traveller advances towards an unknown destination, the surroundings adapt and evolve into a collage of numerous scenarios, ranging from surreal to dystopian, hallucinogenic to bleak. Beeple will periodically update this virtual landscape, using materials from the internet and his own practice to respond to the situation of the world.

HUMAN ONE provides the observer with a prism through which they can comprehend contemporary visual culture as a malleable and ever-evolving experience, symbolized by a figure locked within a hermetically sealed box yet yearning for endless mobility, groping towards an infinite infinity. The astonishing voyage of the traveller serves as a reminder to viewers of the continuing blurring of our own digital and physical existence—a metaphor for human development.