Pace Gallery has unveiled an NFT art project that will feature previously unheard vocal samples from Joy Division. The project was created in collaboration with the English rock band’s influential drummer Stephen Morris, album artist Peter Saville and the official Joy Division Archive.
The gallery’s Pace Verso division’s “CP1919” series, which includes two NFT drops, features a soundtrack created by Morris and vocal samples from the archives of late Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis.
The project also builds on the iconic Saville cover of Joy Division’s seminal album ‘Unknown Pleasures’, released in 1979 by Factory Records. The title of the NFT series comes from the name of the original heartbeat of the collapsed star that inspired the series. album artwork.
A still image from the animated artwork “CP1919: Sweeping Sun White 2023”. Image: Pace Verso
“CP1919” will feature animated 3D images of Saville, the multidisciplinary artist who created artwork for both Joy Division and subsequent band New Order (formed by the surviving members of Joy Division) between 1979 and 1993.
“CP1919: Sweeping Sun Black 2023” will be a one-of-a-kind NFT featuring both footage and a soundtrack that will never be made available to the public. The winner of the auction organized by Pace Verso will receive a unique ‘experiential artwork’ on a commemorative hard drive in a unique slipcase.
Meanwhile, “CP1919: Sweeping Sun White 2023” will be an open edition NFT that includes an “auditory component” with the newly discovered sound samples. Owners can also claim a free t-shirt, with each shirt corresponding to their NFT. The project will be released on October 9 for $100 per edition, with buyers able to pay by crypto or credit card.
A percentage of the proceeds from all ‘CP1919’ artworks will be donated to the suicide prevention charity CALM, in memory of Curtis, who took his own life in 1980.
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Pace Gallery also shared a filmed interview between Morris, Saville and Joy Division fan and renowned physicist Brian Cox. The film reveals that the vocal samples of “CP1919” include two phrases from the live version of Joy Division’s “Atrocity Exhibition,” the opening track from their second and final album, “Closer.” The recordings were never released.
“I was lucky enough to find a piece of Ian that probably no one had heard before,” Morris said. He also used the original heartbeat of the collapsed star to create the music.
“It gives me goosebumps when I hear it,” Saville added.
