Robocobra Quartet Grow 100 Petri Dishes of Mould for Album Cover

Belfast group Robocobra Quartet have created the cover art for their 100-track album Hundred Pieces using 100 petri dishes of fungus grown at home by saxophonist Thibault Barillon. The band, whose sound blends jazz, hardcore punk and contemporary classical, was inspired by Serbian performance artist Marina Abramović to make the five-hour record. Barillon began the project before the album was conceived, buying agar plates and experimenting with different organic matter to cultivate mould. Each dish was photographed identically—dead-centre on a square white background—and some were re-shot weeks later as the cultures evolved. The 100 images will accompany the 100 tracks, and a rapid-fire GIF cycling through them will serve as the Spotify canvas for the key track Haha, due in about a week. The album, created with zero use of AI, is set for release in November. The artwork required no large budget, expert team or professional brainstorming, and its generative, chance-based process mirrors the band's recording approach.