Hokkaido Hanami
Capturing the transient beauty of nature through onchain art that only renders two weeks a year.
Since I was a teenager, I have deeply loved cherry blossoms. The flowers themselves are incredibly beautiful, but, for many, appreciation of them goes deeper. Compared to other flowers, the blossoms are particularly short-lived. In Japan, cherry blossoms have become a symbol of the “mono no aware” ethos — a bittersweet appreciation for the transience of things.
Most attempts to capture this experience in art fail, simply because in most media, it is difficult to make an experience that only displays for a couple of weeks out of a year. However, during my admiration of the blossoms this year, it dawned on me how this could be setup using smart contracts. Furthermore, given my fascination with generating SVG art fully on-chain, the idea that became Hokkaido Hanami quickly came together in my mind.
However, by that point, all the cherry blossoms in the area had passed. I worried I was too late — that I needed to release this project next year. But then it hit me: the further north that you are, the later the blossoms bloom, due to the colder average temperatures. Hokkaido’s hanami — blossom viewing — season had not yet even begun. Rather than bloom during the early April to which I was accustomed here in Atlanta, I could make them bloom in early May instead.
I’ve always enjoyed exploring the liminal space between seemingly contradictory dualities. The point of an NFT using on-chain rendering is to be eternal. Even an IPFS link going unseeded cannot separate you from the art. A record of it always exists on its host chain, inseparably a part of it. Cherry blossoms, on the other hand, are the embodiment of ephemerality, championed in part because the windows to appreciate them are so small.
Each year, the smart contract’s blossom rendering function will only run for a two week window: May 1st to May 14th UTC. Outside of that time, it will return a simple blue square — the color of the sky on a beautiful day but lacking the short-lived blossoms that define the experience of the collection. The placement, color, shape, and number of blossoms is random from piece to piece, so no two are alike, and some may speak to you more than others.
Up to 10,000 may be minted on Berachain for only 4.08 BERA (about $12) each — Buddha’s birthday and a day I traditionally have associated with blossoms blooming here in Georgia. Perhaps something in the 5.01 - 5.14 BERA range would have better matched the lore, but the primary goal of this project is to spread appreciation of an ephemeral form of beauty, not make tons of money.
My deep hope is that at least a small handful of people will anticipate the return of these onchain blossoms in much the way people do with blossoms in the real world — and maybe even help some people develop an appreciation for real world hanami in the process. More and more places around the world — not just Japan — offer ideal viewing experiences, though as of May, it’s now too late in most places.
But part of the bittersweet joy of sakura is, though they may be gone so quickly, they always come back every year, and it can be a part of the spring awakening that you come to anticipate each year during the waning wintry winds of February. And even if you are not one to use crypto, you can partake in this experience — all the art is there for everyone to enjoy for those two weeks.