Throughout history, art has served as the greatest source of inspiration for many people. Trends evolve faster than ever in the age of cryptocurrency and the digitized world. For years, a number of artists have attempted to enter increasingly evolving playgrounds and claim a piece of the pie, but now is their moment.
The NFT craze has swept the industry, transforming visual artists and influential meme makers into millionaires. It’s difficult to predict when this euphoria will fade, but we’ll almost certainly see more market records and exciting experiments in this field before the hype train ends.
From a few pennies to a fortune
The market cap of nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, has grown nearly tenfold between 2018 and 2020, indicating rapid growth. From small forums to the oldest auction houses, the transition was lightning quick. Christie’s has foreseen the trend and has launched successful NFT sales after successful NFT sales. Various artworks and collectibles have fetched six-figure sums — and more. The artist Mike Winkelmann, also known as Beeple, recently set a new world record by paying over $69 million for a JPEG file. Is it possible that this might have been expected a few decades ago?
Nine rare CryptoPunks NTFs will be auctioned off at the world-famous auction house on May 11. The auction house exclaimed, “For the first time, 5,184 pixels worth of a groundbreaking NFT project will go up for auction at a conventional auction house.” The overall selling price is expected to be between $7 million and $9 million, but it may be even higher, given that one of these tokens sold for $7.5 million in March.
The new boom in the NFT market is exemplified by CryptoPunks. Matt Hall and John Watkinson, founders of the New York-based software company Larva Labs, started the project by creating 10,000 24×24 pixel photographs of people. It’s hard to believe that the project’s creators gave these NFTs away for free to members of the crypto group. After half a year, the price has risen to several thousand dollars, and these collectibles are now being sold for millions of dollars. What drives people to spend the equivalent of a garage full of luxury cars on unusual pixel digital art?
The excitement stems from the growing importance of cryptocurrencies around the world, as well as the fact that these limited editions are among the first collectibles on the crypto market.
The motivations were demonstrated by Tatiana Stiskina, an art historian and adviser:
“Even before Christie’s announced their sale on May 11, I wanted to buy a CryptoPunk. As a result, my husband and I purchased it the day Christie’s revealed the sale. Since CryptoPunks are created using an algorithm, they are a deeper symbol not only of cryptoart, but also of the tech industry. The algorithms are idolized by those who brought us everything relevant to hi-tech and home theater.”
Getting to the bottom of NFT’s popularity
What makes NFT merchandise so attractive and unique? Blockchain is a game-changing technology that affects almost every industry. The ownership record cannot be falsified, and NFTs cannot be copied and pasted. These tokens, which are operated by distributed ledger technology, are nonreplicable and cannot be substituted, with only one owner at a time. Despite being labeled “nonfungible,” NFTs are liquid and can be bought or sold on Ethereum-based markets due to their interchangeable features and fungibility.
CryptoPunks were among the first NFTs, launching on the Ethereum blockchain in 2017. These tokens are nonfungible since they follow the ERC-721 protocol standard, which means they are one-of-a-kind and cannot be replaced by another.
Why are some tokens worth pennies, while others gain tens of thousands of dollars in value, and still others are worth millions? The price is determined by analyzing the rarity of unique qualities that are valued in the crypto art and culture. Despite the fact that CryptoPunks have been the forerunners in the field, there are other examples that can rival their success. This sector, like any other lucrative opportunity, has become overcrowded with sharks looking to profit from the situation by defrauding customers and collectors. This pattern is unsurprising when you consider that the overall volume of NFT transactions quadrupled to $250 million last year.
A glimpse into the future
It’s impossible to say how long the anchor of NFTs will continue to entice wealthy investors. Some believe the bubble would burst sooner than the initial coin offering craze did. Right now, a fresh perspective combined with good taste can be able to make a difference and improve things. A new ship would arrive at the NFT’s blockchain harbor, promising such transformations.
The crypto world went nuts last week over a new NFT collectible project — The Bored Ape Yacht Club, a group of 10,000 Bored Ape NFTs living on the Ethereum blockchain — of one-of-a-kind digital collectibles that sold out on the primary market. This is an exciting project that tries to incorporate gamification and group elements, and it will be fascinating to see where it goes from here.
After just a few days, the Ksoids project, which debuted on April 22 as an NFT project, rocketed to the top of the OpenSea rankings. Over 900 of the 1,000 tickets were sold, but some are still available at auction. Ksoids are algorithmically unique creatures whose breath of fresh air and best-in-class imagination did not go unnoticed by digital art lovers, collectors, fans, and investors, calling it a true indie project. Ksoids are the first generative art of 3D characters who not only build their own world but also assist in the protection of ours. Orangutan Outreach, a charitable organization dedicated to saving orangutans in their natural habitat, will receive 20% of each sale.
The new Larva Labs NFT range has been the talk of the crypto world in recent days, with the public sale selling out in hours. A custom generative algorithm recorded on the Ethereum blockchain creates the Meebits, which are 20,000 unique 3D voxel characters. Larva Labs made a whopping $72,976,613 from the public offering, according to data from Dune Analytics.
What’s behind the digital collectibles craze?
Any new record in a highly speculative market becomes less remarkable than the previous one. People would still be able to pay exorbitant sums of money for experimental ideas simply to satisfy their curiosity or to stand out from the crowd.
NFTs are seen by some high-profile investors as a way to diversify their crypto portfolios and shape new types of elite clubs, and the majority of new market participants believe that digital art will become extremely expensive in the future. The only logical next step is for the market to mature and progress, as well as for professionals to step in and set quality standards.