- NFT 1 Textile Techniques 01 by zachdarren
- NFT 2 A moment of light. by spongenuity
- NFT 3 Here honey let me straighten your tie by this person
- NFT 4 CryptoSnail by @im3dartist
So, words brain is bad right now but I guess we’re gonna do this anyway:
Looking at the endless scroll of NFTs on my screen reminds me of the good ol’ days when tumblr.com was a prime platform for sharing artistic content: two squares of Amazing Content, ten squares of Decent Content, and three squares of content that makes you question why humans possess the ability to create. NFTs seem to take this to an elitist extent in some cases, though, with people selling art that worships the ethereum currency for thousands of dollars and the low, low, price of ecological destruction. In other cases, like hic et nunc, it isn’t so bad, where there’s a digital platform to distribute one’s art but it also is founded upon the use of a digital currency that isn’t ethically, eh, bad. That being said, I doubt hic et nunc has the overall traction or presence that other sites such as foundation have, and therefore the method by which you peruse its art is a bit unrefined, in my opinion.
Who makes this art? Artists. Or, in the case of the fourth work listed above, devout worshippers of online currency that–I’m trying to keep an open mind here–are probably okay-ish people, but like… why do art that is that openly based off the snail from an ill-remembered DreamWorks movie and cites a particular mode of currency that is (despite whatever positive impacts it may have) not environmentally good as a source of hope? I don’t know. The idea of holding any sort of currency in that regard just seems so disgusting to me.
Who goes for this art? I think it depends on which platform one observes. I’ve been told that hic et nunc is supported in part by artists supporting each other’s work, but if we talk a walk over to foundation you’ll see things going for the equivalent of tens of thousands of US dollars, which, I don’t think your average person has to spend on art in a single purchase. Therefore, I’m looking at sites in the tier of foundation as supported by uber-capitalist tech bros who care little about the environmental impact of NFTs, rather than a well-meaning community.