Fine Art Collector | Spring 2022

NFTS VERSUS 'REAL ART'

While the complexity and kitsch style of NFTs is part of their appeal, it can make them more open to judgement, with one critic describing the phenomenon as 'digital garbage' and 'the Emperor's virtual clothes'. The perceived dumbing down of art may be touted by traditionalists, but as The Art Newspaper stated in July 2021: ‘NFTs do not spell the end of IRL [in real life] art, they are simply a new chapter.’ Many NFTs incorporate elements from classical art movements, including the focus on technology seen in 20th-century Futurism in Italy, and the repeated imagery of Pop Art in New York in the1960s. Artists have created NFTs inspired by Banksy, Leonardo da Vinci and Picasso, while Will Gompertz, director of Tate Gallery, likens Beeple's work to the fantastical paintings of Hieronymus Bosch in the 15th century. Noted works are also being transformed into NFTs; in May 2021, Christie's launched Andy Warhol: Machine Made, a collection of five NFTs of digital works created in the 1980s. NFTs are central to the crypto art movement, which is being propelled by projects such as Larva Labs and the Bored Ape Yacht Club. Artists are discovering new forms of art, including digital sculptures, animations, optical illusions, visual translations of data structures and autoglyphs. The latter, which refers to imagery on the Ethereum blockchain that is generated by an algorithm, have been described as 'tantalisingly beautiful' by Sotheby's, who praised the 'blockchain-based artistic purity' that is 'generative minimalism for the NFT age.'

IMPACT ON THE ART MARKET

The origins of the crypto art market date back to 2014, when the New York-based digital artist Kevin McCoy minted his 'Quantum' artwork – a pulsating fluorescent octagon – to create the first-ever NFT alongside tech entrepreneur Anil Dash. The art world took notice, and since then, digital artists including Beeple, Pak, Hackatao and Fewocious have made their name in this fast-moving sector. During the first six months of 2021, sales of NFTs rose by more than $2.5 billion, while Pak's NFT artwork, 'Merge' sold for a record-breaking $91.8 million in December that year. The COVID-19 pandemic has been a catalyst for NFTs, with art galleries and museums turning to augmented and virtual reality to adapt to a new, digital-first climate. In June 2021, Sotheby’s, one of the world’s most prestigious fine art auction houses, opened its flagship metaverse gallery – a digital replica of its headquarters on London’s New Bond Street – in the Voltaire Art District in Decentraland, a virtual reality platform that is powered by the Ethereum blockchain. Its co-head of digital art sales, Michael Bouhanna, described the platform as ‘the next frontier of digital art’. Accessible to anyone with an internet connection, NFTs are breaking down artistic barriers. Teenagers are becoming blue-chip artists (those whose art's worth is expected to increase regardless of the economy), while the BrasilNFT Artes Originárias gallery was launched as the first NFT platform aimed at indigenous artists, drawing much-needed attention to marginalised communities. Lively debate on social media platforms such as Twitter through hashtags like #NFTart and #Cryptoart is sparking further innovation.

What are NFTs and how are they changing the art world?

One of the biggest buzzwords of 2021, NFTs have been touted as a new dimension for creative expression and digital ownership, allowing artists and brands to share their work like never before. With Christie's and Sotheby's embracing the crypto art phenomenon, and record-breaking sales of up to $91.8 million, we explore the latest movement to spearhead the future of contemporary art.

of data that cannot be modified without altering all subsequent blocks. This means they are not interchangeable (fungible), and the token therefore represents ownership of the asset. Pretty much anything digital can be an NFT. In February 2021, the American comic illustrator and pixel artist Chris Torres sold 'Nyan Cat', a viral meme of a Pop Tart-bodied cat zooming through space, for around $580,000. The next month, Twitter CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey sold his first tweet – ‘ just setting up my twttr’ – for over $2.9 million. Other NFTs have included the original lines of source code for the World Wide Web, a burnt Banksy print, and the globally-shared 'Charlie Bit My Finger' YouTube video. NFTs are bought and sold on NFT marketplaces like Open Sea, Rarible and Nifty Gateway, which function as digital auction houses or sales platforms, where buyers can bid or select a 'buy now' option, and pay via cryptocurrency (a secure virtual currency).

WHAT IS AN NFT?

An NFT (non-fungible token) is a unique digital label or a certificate of authenticity than can be attached to assets (digital or physical) to give them undeniable provenance. JPEG image files, MP3 audio files or MP4 video files can all be stored on a digital ledger called a blockchain. These files are tokenised, whereby data is transformed into a random string of code. The records (blocks) contain a timestamp and details of the previous block, forming a chain

16 FINE ART COLLECTOR SPRING / SUMMER 2022

FINE ART COLLECTOR SPRING / SUMMER 2022 17

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