About

Before the world was paying attention, artists were training neural networks and minting the results on-chain. Began is a record of that work — 258 pieces made between 2015 and 2018 on Ethereum, Bitcoin, and Namecoin, before AI art had a name or an audience.

GANs. Style transfer. Early diffusion. Techniques that were experimental then, foundational now. The artists who made these works were the first. This archive exists so that isn't forgotten.

Many of these works predate the platforms that would later define the NFT art market. They were minted without expectation of an audience, often using contracts and protocols that no longer exist. What remains is the work itself — timestamped, immutable, on-chain.

This is the first chapter. 2019 to the present is being catalogued.