NFTs and Digital Art

Introduction This article is concerned with the recent rise in popularity of crypto art, term given to digital artworks whose ownership and provenance are confirmed a non-fungible token (NFT), making it possible sell these works within decentralised cryptocurrency art markets. The goal this analysis trace genealogy Dada, an avant-garde movement that originated early twentieth century. My claim Dadaism appears its exhausted form result revival 1950s 1960s by Neo Dada reached current age through Pop Art. Dada’s anti-art project rejecting beauty aesthetics has transformed into commercial success Art movement. In turn, produced version explores not only question what not, but also when becomes money. follows, I will provide brief overview NFT three categories could generally be found marketplaces: native non-digital distributed-creativity art. Throughout, foreground presence historical context. NFTs: Brief Overview A major technological component made NFTs was developed 1991, cryptographers Stuart Haber W. Scott Stornetta proposed method for time-stamping data contained documents shared distributed network users (99). work laid foundation became known as blockchain further implemented development Bitcoin, currency invented Satoshi Nakamoto 2008. original tokens, Coloured Coins, were created 2012. By “colouring” or differentiating bitcoins, Coins assigned special properties had value independent underlying allowing their use commodity certificates, alternative currencies, other financial instruments (Assia et al.). 2014, fuelled motivation protect artists from unsanctioned distribution while enabling sales, media artist Kevin McCoy tech entrepreneur Anil Dash saw potential satisfy goals NFTs. overnight invention Dash’s participation Seven on annual New York City event, one-day creative collaboration challenged seven pairs engineers “make something” (Rhizome). did patent invention, nor they able popularise it, mentally archiving “footnote internet history”. Ironically, just couple years later exploded billion-dollar market, living up ironic name “monetized graphics” pair gave invention. Crypto international sensation March 2021, Mike Winklemann, Beeple, sold his collage titled Everydays: First 5000 Days US$69.3 million, prompting Noah Davis, curator who assisted sale at Christie’s auction house, proclaim: “he showed us collage, my eureka moment knew going extremely important. It so monumental indicative can do” (Kastrenakes). As technology, create scarcity otherwise infinitely replicable space. Contrary fungible which easily interchangeable due having equal value, tokens represent unique items one cannot find equivalent. That why we rely fungibility money exchange goods, such Employing allows owning exchanging outside context originated. Now, prove one’s possession skin videogame, example, markets using (“Bible”). Behind technology lies cryptographic hash function, converts artwork any file size fixed-length hash, called message digest (Dooley 179). impossible revert process arrive image, quality non-reversibility makes function perfect tool creating representation proofed tampering. issued minted enters blockchain, database too relies guarantee fidelity security stored. Once part transaction history permanently recorded publicly available. Thus, simultaneously serves proof ownership. traded marketplaces, SuperRare, KnownOrigin, OpenSea, Rarible, sustain operations. An markets’ inventory summarised following list roughly grouped types artistic available purchase: creativity Native category, include projects motivated creation protocols. Among aforementioned Colored These followed issuing visual creations crypto-world, LarvaLabs’s CryptoPunks, series 10,000 algorithmically generated 8-bit-style pixelated avatars originally free anyone Ethereum account, gaining cult status among collectors rare sought-after items. On 13 February 2022, CryptoPunk #5822 $24 million Ethereum, beating previous record NFT, #3100, $7.58 million. CryptoPunks collectible personal profile projects, Bored Ape Yacht Club Cool Cats. One ultimate collections demonstrates exhaustion motivations Monas, 5,000 programmatically versions Mona Lisa Leonardo da Vinci (c. 1503-1506). Each according creators, “a mix Art, history, references iconic NFTs” (“Monas”). Monas potpourri meme pop culture, infused inside jokes utmost silliness. invariably bring mind historic Dadaist gesture challenging bourgeois tastes defacing works, Marcel Duchamp’s treatment L.H.O.O.Q. 1919, Duchamp drew moustache goatee reproduction La Joconde, French painting, inscribed “L.H.O.O.Q.” pronounced sounds like “Elle chaud au cul”, vulgar expression indicating sexual arousal subject. At time creation, act met public contempt, considered sacred patron arts, almost religious symbol (Elger Grosenick 82). Needless say, effect consciousness far causing disgust and, contrary, brings childish joy giggles. artist, Mankind, explains YouTube video projects: “PFPs built around people enjoy. People enjoy memes, status, being something bigger than themselves, basic primary desire social belong community”. Somehow, “being themselves” come involve collecting defaced images Lisa. Turning our attention help transformation insult object. Its Legacy founded 1916 Zurich, Hugo Ball, Tristan Tzara, Hans Richter, fled homelands during World War (Hapgood Rittner 63). aspirations challenge dominance reason brought about tragedy attacking postulates culture produced. Already 1921, André Breton, Louis Aragon, Max Ernst becoming nihilist tendencies rejection all programmes except total freedom expression. dead May leaving no sense regret since, words “its omnipotence tyranny intolerable” (205). important event associated birth publication Painters Poets 1951. volume, first collection writings English most comprehensive anthology language, introduced young School John Cage, revived Tzara’s concept “life more interesting” 64). marked renewed interest evidenced galleries museums organising numerous exhibitions movement, –1923 curated Sidney Janis Gallery 1953. end decade, Jasper Johns Robert Rauschenberg began exploring materials techniques attributed Dadaism, prompted title describe thematic return approaches borrowed Duchampian readymades object, Kurt Schwitters’s technique incorporating often banal scraps pieces everyday, chance operations compositional device 63–64). comprise toolbox well. collages everyday Internet life assembled configurations operation application algorithmic generation each series. historian Helen Molesworth sees strategies montage, readymade, “mechanisms objects” “abdications traditional forms labor” (178). argues readymade “substituted (artistic) production consumption” “profoundly questioned role, stability, nature, necessity artist’s (179). Together questioning need labour, Dadaists inherited American Jack D. Flam terms “anything goes” attitude: liberating destruction rules derision canon allowed anything everything (xii). approach traced contemporary artists, assembling daily training sketches teaching himself new tools When asked whether he genuinely liked images, Beeple explained teams working over course days even weeks. “is pooping out 45 minutes”, probably gonna look great comparatively” (Cieplak-Mayr von Baldegg). core spirit absurdism drove attack social, political, artistic, philosophical norms, constituting radical against Establishment (Flam xii). Anti-Art, Richter’s account describes principle guided “to outrage opinion” (66). point desensitisation towards provocations experienced repetitive assaults, demanding methods disgrace taste. Richter recounts: enough. Not everyone Zurich came pictures, attending meetings, read poems manifestos. devising raising hell essential pro-art, non-art anti-art. And (like insects bacteria) immunity kind poison, think another. (66) paints cultural environment mutate accepted norms quick succession, forming body immune “poisons”. foreword Poets, outlines trajectory acceptance subjugation subsequent movement’s values 1960s. rediscovered writers 1950s, characterised absurdist irony, self-parody, deadpan realism life, if entered own image. Johns, Rauschenberg, Claes Oldenburg, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, existed culturally pluralistic space where quickly absorbed mainstream, mutating high supposedly criticising bringing would have been deeply ashamed xiii). Raoul Hausmann states: “Dada fell raindrop heaven. Neo-Dadaists learnt imitate fall, raindrop” (as quoted Craft 129). With similar sentiment, Richard Huelsenbeck writes: “Neo-Dada turned weapons used Surrealism, popular ploughshares till fertile soil sensation-hungry eager business” 130). Duchamp, forefather avant-garde, comments loss intent: Neo-Dada, call Realism, Assemblage, etc., easy way out, lives did. discovered ready-mades thought discourage aesthetics. Neo-Dada taken aesthetic them. threw bottle-rack urinal faces now admire them beauty. xiii) impulse converted opposite, stance notes gradual transformations resulted shifts consciousness, difficult insult. Artists, complained make despicable: dirty rug admired audience lost ability understand mocked, attacked, challenged. Writing 1981, proclaimed become inescapable condition modern life” (xiv). contend thrives absurdism, self-parody continues border between non-art, fully subscribing approach. iteration world, subversive narrative mostly rhetoric promoted proponents economic system. While understood futility shocking tastes, ignorant outrage, revolutionary ignited passion. ambiguous relationship movements, content artworks. Tzara laconically explained, “assassinate beauty” infrastructure market Danto 39). descendants erected monument Value artificially place denigrated Venus demolished Dadaists. After all, astronomical prices lauded most. If pre-NFT age, evaluated based merit included considering prominence canon, rareness, titles SuperRare Rarible unambiguously refer (Finucane 28–29). anti-commercialism opposite. Another evidence descendant artists’ concern table artists. expressed manifesto-like mission statement Museum Art: core, (M○C△) challenges, creates conflict, provokes. M○C△ puts forward broad perspectives meant upend are. poses two questions: “what art?” “who decides?” We aim resolve questions multi-stakeholder decentralized platform curation exhibition. (The Art) past, regarding definition overtaken proponent institutional definition, George Dickie, besides excluding playing famously monkey displayed institution, elsewhere (Dickie 256). might explain decentralisation achieved still endorsing widely acclaimed houses: stamp approval, christened legitimate resulting sales. Non-Digital surprising marketplace inviting arena investigation commercialisation tackled names world. discussion second type trained Damien Hirst. Currency, Hirst “the boundaries currency—when changes currency, art” (“The Currency”). consists A4 paper covered small, coloured dots, continuation so-called “spot-paintings” assistants producing since 1980s. painted hand-made bears watermark bust, adorned microdot identification, very others—visual devices highlight state Hirst-issued currency. For Hirst, experiment: after purchase NFTs, buyers opportunity safely stored UK vault; unexchanged burned. Is transform currency? Will you save it? Hirst’s project, physical nihilism, big difference: wanted destroy invent anew, destroys affirm death dissolution gesture, gif Nino Arteiro, agreement attempts Synonymous Profit, contains crudely written text “ART ≠ PROFIT!” 0.13 Ether US$350. Buying negate analogy Distributed-Creativity browsing advertised markets, inevitably encounters stand emphasis formal qualities. More Artificial Intelligence (AI). To viewer bombarded unconcerned beauty, AI may serve sensory refuge. prominent realm Refik Anadol, Synthetic Dreams glance appear carefully composed landscape painter. However, closer nodal connections points rendered hint processes. attractive landscapes quantum paintings set consisting 200 raw image computed bit string (“Synthetic Dreams”). Upon contemplation, Anadol’s begins remind sublime Romantic landscapes, revamped fascination nature’s unboundedness awe face unfathomable amounts works. seen reaction marketing targets different audience. either case, Anadol revives aligns sublimity dates back Longinus, prime importance nineteenth-century finding expressions sublime, which, David E. Nye. concentrates “on triumph machines… time” Butler al. 8). relation Nature exhibition’s eponymous, Data Sculpture, utilizes 300 photographs nature collected 2018- 2021 Studio” (“Machine Hallucinations From short description evident focus large sets data. There issue approach: experiencing involves rational thinking (Longinus 1.4), cease viewer’s interrogate adaptation stay decorative ornamentations, intervention akin avant-garde. Conclusions hope mechanisms strains vocabulary noticeable equate Cryptocurrency many ends history—one needs remember painting announced myriad times, yet alive. announcement radiant return. package monetary art’s capacity affect human lives, ignite power challenge, inspire, enrich. References Assia, Yoni “Colored Whitepaper.” 2012-13. <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AnkP_cVZTCMLIzw4DvsW6M8Q2JC0lIzrTLuoWu2z1BE/edit>. André. “Three Manifestoes, before 1924.” Poets: Anthology, Ed. Motherwell, Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press Harvard UP, 1989. 197–206. Butler, Rebecca P., Benjamin J. Butler. “Examples Technological Sublime.” TechTrends 57.1 (2013): 9–10. Craft, Catherine Anne. Constellations Past Present: (Neo-) Avant- Garde, World, 1951-1965. 1996. PhD dissertation. University Texas Austin. 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