Giga Blocks X
a garden

a garden is a work of generative art by Cole Sternberg. Giga, a partnership between UNICEF and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), commissioned the California-based conceptual artist to create a garden as a visual means of enriching, intensifying, and illuminating the global school connectivity data encompassed by Giga Blocks. The ongoing project will comprise over one million unique digital pieces, each reflecting and responding to the evolving real-world conditions within Giga’s adaptive school database.

Explore a garden

SchoolBrazil

Meliponário Pólen Dourado

50K+ and Counting

artworks

Global

schools covered

Permanent

on-chain record

Watch: Giga Blocks X a garden

A short overview of how school data and generative art come together in Giga: a garden.

Data → Art

School data drives generative visuals — location, connectivity, infrastructure.

On-Chain Permanence

Art and data live on the blockchain, resistant to platform changes.

Dynamic Identity

As a school’s connectivity evolves, so does its visual identity.

About the Artist: Cole Sternberg

Cole Sternberg is a California-based conceptual artist whose interdisciplinary practice spans painting, sculpture, installation, film, photography, performance, and writing. Sternberg contrasts human aspiration with the regenerative power of the environment while deconstructing cultural and historical myths across analyses of art, language, law, and infrastructure. His practice centers on acts of erasure, poetic disruption, and collaboration with natural forces. He has exhibited globally and his work is held in major collections, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), American University Museum (AUM), Museum of New and Old Art (MONA), Villanova University, and Deutsche Telekom.

For Giga, Sternberg built a garden, a long-form generative system that turns school data into living art.

More about Cole Sternberg

Visibility that unlocks support

For a school to be supported, it must first be located. Anchoring verified school data in a permanent digital archive makes schools visible to partners, donors, and decision-makers.

Open, transparent infrastructure

By keeping data open and on-chain, Giga creates a platform for transparent, open-source financing for school connectivity.

A region-aware visual system

The algorithm draws from a curated library of 200+ plant genera and 1,300 vintage botanical photographs. Region and connectivity status shape each composition.

Stages of growth

Stage one — a school is located.
Stage two — a school has coverage.
Stage three — a school is connected.

The work is deterministic and regenerable from on-chain data (cached to IPFS for speed).

Scale and ambition

a garden will encompass over one million artworks as schools are added — each a proof of existence in the global archive.

A human dimension to infrastructure data

Each artwork acknowledges the individuality of a school — students, teachers, and communities striving for opportunity. Visibility supports resource allocation, policy coordination, and development.

“By Giga’s commitment to pairing the schools with an artistic statement, there is a reminder as to the importance of the creative arts in schools… pairing such knowledge and advancement with the creative arts in order to engender positive progression.”

How It Works

Stage One: A school is located.

The school is verified and anchored on-chain in Giga Blocks. The artist-designed custom algorithm composes an initial artwork from artist-sourced and curated botanical sources.

Stage Two: A school has coverage.

The artwork grows from grayscale to solar tones.

Stage Three: A school is connected.

As a school is connected online, the library of the world opens to it, and the artwork takes on a full range of palette possibilities.

Explore a garden

Explore the 50,000 schools that are already on the blockchain, each represented by a unique generative artwork from a garden that grows and evolves alongside its connectivity journey.

No NFTs found

FAQ

What is Giga Blocks?

A decentralized platform that captures school data globally and generates a unique digital painting for each school.

What is Giga: a garden?

A long-form generative art piece that turns each school's verified data into a visual identity.

Can the artwork change over time?

Yes — as a school’s connectivity status or infrastructure changes, its artwork will evolve in response.

Have questions or want to collaborate? We’d love to hear from you.