Floor is Rising

Non-speculative NFT search engine - Nathaniel Naddaff-Hafrey, Karthik Thiyagarajan

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 03 Apr 2023 09:00:00 +0800

The Founders of https://twitter.com/lasso_labs

https://twitter.com/nnhafrey

and Karthik Thiyagarajan

talk about the NFT search engine they built.

Summary

How did you get into NFTs?

0:00

Combining NFT data silos seamlessly to power new use cases.

4:26

Non-speculative use cases of NFTs.

9:39

Crypto-native games.

15:07

How Lassolabs index NFT data.

19:27

Learnings from early product feedback from users.

25:24

Utility as a proxy for NFT community health.

30:08

NFT AMMs - Spencer Yang

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sun, 05 Feb 2023 09:00:00 +0800

Timestamps;

How Spencer got involved with Crypto Kitties in Asia?

2:27

What’s unique about the asian market in the NFT space?

5:00

The current landscape of the NFT trading market.

11:22

What does the future of NFT trading marketplaces look like?

20:49

How are NFT AMMs superior to regular NFT marketplaces.

23:41

New usecases for NFT AMMs specifically for NFT projects in bootstrapping liquidity.

27:04

Collection.xyz how does it work?

33:44

Links

https://twitter.com/spenceryang

https://twitter.com/collectionweb3

Reddit NFTs - 0xBoffin - Bull thesis

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 17 Nov 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Boffin talks about how NFTs is an emotionally loaded term, and that many people would buy NFTs if they were not called that.

Boffin talks his theory of why reddit NFTs will accrue value, and the longer the collectible lasts, the more people get on board, the oldest ones will be worth the most.

Boffin says the earliest people have the best handles on twitter, and that they can use flex to stand out.

Boffin says that Reddit NFTs is a pretty big bet personally for him on the long term future of them.

Boffin talks about how the product decisions of the Reddit team have an impact on the future value of Reddit NFTs and how much they want to support the project.

Boffin says owning the collectible avatars makes owners financially invested in reddit making good product decisions going forward. Boffin mentions the governance stack they’ve built on Arbitrum.

Boffin talks about how he evaluates projects in general and talks about how to predict if a narrative will take off. Boffin talks about various narratives that he thought would take off but hasn't including Cool Cats. It has been directionless and the floor of the cool cats community has dropped.

Boffin discusses the narrative of Squiggles as another example of a narrative that didn't take off like he thought.

Boffin discusses his favourite nfts and says he like buying from small artists.

Timestamps

How he got into crypto in 2013. 1:33

The amount of capital he’s spent on reddit NFTs. 7:41

How to stand out in a digital world. 16:58

How much does reddit want to continue to support NFTs? 22:50

How traits work in Reddit NFTs - 25:56

NFT thesis that didn’t work out. 32:46

Coolcats, an example of a narrative that didn’t take off. 39:09

What is your favourite NTFT and why? - 43:30

Links;

https://twitter.com/NinjaBoffin/status/1585626484731174912

https://twitter.com/NinjaBoffin/

Capital markets for the Metaverse - present and future - David Choi, Conor Moore - Metastreet

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 08 Nov 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Episode Show Notes

Conor Moore discusses the two schools of thought on NFT lending markets, the peer to peer market vs the peer to pool market. And the various pros and cons of each approach. Conor Moore talks about how the inspiration for Metastreet vaults was to take the benefits of peer to pool and overlay that behind the peer to peer market.

David Choi discusses Powersweep, an integration to increase captive use case for the vaults. David Choi notes that early on, users of the vaults were doing a positive carry trade because of the low cost of capital. That use case disappeared with the bear market onset. Now, they are pioneering use cases around leveraged NFT trading.

Conor Moore talks about the how the leveraged purchase of NFTs is similar to real world examples of leveraged purchases such as real estate. David Choi notes that he didn't like the trad art lending markets because it’s slimy, fascinated by cash flow generating NFTs. David Choi talks about his vision for what Metastreet is building.

David Choi discusses the Metaverse Economic Forum (MEF) and notes that their goal is to bring builders together into a more cohesive community to create the capital markets of the metaverse.

David Choi and Conor Moore talk about what their favourite NFTs are.

Timestamps

The bad and the good of peer-to-peer lending markets. 6:06

What is the use case for NFT lending? 11:17

What are the differences between how people use borrowed funds in the art lending market vs. NFT lending? 16:12

What is the non-recourse art lending industry?

19:43

Do you think that a completely different demographic of people needs to come in order for NFTs to go "mainstream"?

25:15

What’s the future of capital markets in the metaverse?

29:34

Liquidity and price discovery in the metaverse.

37:41

Links

https://metastreet.xyz/

https://mobile.twitter.com/_conormoore

https://twitter.com/ktkzergs

How to get beyond speculation in web3 gaming - 0xKepler

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 13 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0800

If you’re interested in the Web3 gaming space then today’s episode is for you! We’ll be unpacking where Web3 gaming is currently at, the trends we’ve been noticing, and what developments we expect to see from this field going forward. Here to help us unpack this topic is special guest, Kepler, a builder, and writer who specializes in crypto and the Web3 gaming space. Tuning in you’ll hear us discuss the state of Web3 gaming, the role that speculation plays in feeding this ecosystem, and how these games are succeeding (and failing) at creating new genres and formats. Our conversation covers some of the challenges that Web3 gaming is currently facing, including how to support both investors and gamers, and what it means to create an infrastructure that accommodates a range of risk profiles. We also discuss the concept of social innovation in gaming, how Web3 is facilitating it, and what some of our favourite Web3 games.

Key Points From This Episode:

Get to know today’s guest, Kepler, and how he got into the Web3 gaming space.
Top takeaways from the recent article that Kepler wrote on Web3 gaming.
Kepler’s thoughts on the future of Web3 gaming and how to limit speculation.
The potential for people to play Web3 games for fun, and not just with an earning mindset.
An overview of battle royale games and how they are significant to Web3 gaming.
The potential role that esports and streamers could play in Web3 gaming.
A breakdown of the analogy that compares Web3 games to nightclubs.
How to create a Web3 game that accommodates a range of players.
Why Web3 games should have the option of playing with different risk profiles.
The concept of permadeath and how it affects your gaming experience.
The difficult decision many Web3 games are facing when it comes to prioritizing their investors or their gamers.
The new genres and functionalities that crypto and Web3 gaming could potentially offer.
How Web3 gameplay is paving the way for social innovation.
Why developers need to understand what different players are motivated by.
The benefits of giving people the opportunity to explore all your gaming features.
The real reasons why NFT and Web3 gaming has grown so quickly.
Learn what Kepler’s favourite Web3 game of the moment is!

Tweetables:

“When you open the economy to everyone, even players that are not inside the game, and you allow for trading, you also open it up to speculation. And that can basically destroy your whole game.” — Kepler

“You probably shouldn't make every asset into an NFT. Because it just becomes way harder for you to control the economy.”

“Crypto is basically risky. So what you could do is have players self-select a risk profile. So when you're looking at an esports game, some people just want to play the game, and others want to play wager matches. So that's much higher risk.”

“At one point, mobile games got a template and then everyone did it. There's nothing like that in Web3 gaming, for now. But I think that's also the interesting part of it because we're in the exploration phase and not the exploitation phase of ideas.”

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Floor Is Rising

Inside the Japanese NFT Scene - Takuya Kitagawa and AT

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 05 Sep 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Ever wondered how different the world of NFTs is in Japan? Well, today we are lucky enough to be joined by two great guests, Takuya Kitagawa and AT, to give us some real, first-hand insight into the overlaps and contrasts that are happening with regard to the burgeoning scene. We have a great conversation unpacking some basics about our guests' entry into the NFT space, and what initially drew them in. From there we look at the major hallmarks of what is popular right now in Japan, and how this compares to the rest of the world, before talking about important aspects of the field such as influencer and celebrity marketing. Takuya and AT then spend some time illuminating the inner workings of Nannda, and some more general thoughts on game design, and we finish off our chat by considering which types of games appeal to different Japanese demographics and why. Join us to hear it all!

Key Points From This Episode:

Our guests' paths into working in the NFT space, and their initial excitement about it.
Insight into the state of the Japanese scene right now.
Thoughts on the current NFT projects that are having success in Japan.
Contextualising differences in the Japanese market and some reasons for popularity.
Influencer marketing of NFTs and the main drives for demand.
The culture of big celebrity endorsement for brands and how this figures into the NFT landscape.
Barriers to entry that are influencing the Japanese market right now.
Comparing the mechanism at Nannda to other examples of play-to-earn.
Risk and reward in the two different approaches to game design.
The importance of the social dimension to games to increase engagement and difficulty.
Japanese audiences' attitudes towards different types of games.
Favourite NFT picks from Takuya and AT!

Tweetables:

“Influencer marketing itself is big in Japan, YouTubers are big, TikTokers are big. But this actually hasn't come to the NFT world yet.”

“Japanese audiences play any kind of game, individual oriented game or a social game. Either way works. If it is a more individual game, you typically have to do more campaigns.”

“When I see the Nouns community evolving really well, I get really excited, seeing that maybe that is the future of NFTs.”

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Takuya Kitagawa on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

2022 FIR NFT Awards: Category - Gaming

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0800

This week we continue with our NFT awards. Today’s category is people’s favourite NFT games. Joining us in conversation is one of the most influential voices in the NFT space today, Mete Gultekin aka Vader Research! Tune in to hear about the games that ranked in the top three, the strategy of game-makers, and why liquidity is essential within the NFT marketplace. You’ll also hear our thoughts on whether compelling NFT gaming is possible, how our game that ranked first brought people into the world of NFTs, NFT gaming, and crypto. Our guest also reveals the unexpected similarities between the gaming and nightclub promotional models and touches on the sociological implications of the changing gaming space. Tune in today to hear more from this expert in all things NFT gaming!

Key Points From This Episode:

Today’s topic, continuing in our conversation on NFT awards: your favourite NFT games.
Gods Unchained, how it works, and why it ranked third place in the NFT game awards.
How blockchain-based games strategise monetarily.
What Web3 games will change about their approach going forwards.
Why trading mechanisms depend on a healthy secondary market and a friction-free marketplace.
The importance of liquidity and balance within the NFT marketplace.
Second place: Forgotten Runes.
The crossover between art, metaverse, NFTs, and gaming.
Answering the question of whether compelling gaming is possible.
Our game that ranked first and how it brought people into NFTs, NFT gaming, and crypto.
What has driven growth for Axie Infinity, and why the number of game players has dropped even though the quality has improved.
How the NFT gaming space can be approached in the same way as the nightclub model.
The expectations for Axie that have not been met and why it is increasingly difficult to get gamers’ attention.
Game design and the different roles one can have, from pure enjoyment to monetary gain.
Our guest’s thoughts on what makes for compelling gameplay.
Answering the question of whether it’s truly possible to make game play fun in NFT gaming.
The sociological implications of the changing gaming space.

Tweetables:

“Having liquidity is definitely important; otherwise, it’s going to be a very frustrating experience for the players.” — @DeFiVader

“Forgotten Runes is not a typical NFT game in that it appeals to a different crowd. There is a pretty strong delineation between people who are interested in PFPs, people who are interested in art, [and] people who are interested in NFT gaming. There’s some crossover but not a lot.” @SabretoothSG

“One of the things that could create a compelling gameplay, and not just in terms of being fun and enjoyable, where you want to spend ten hours on it, but rather that it is open enough that it is welcoming to anyone who wants to engage.” — @DeFiVader

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Vader Research on Twitter

Night Clubs and Web3 Games

Floor Is Rising

Floor Is Rising on Twitter

2022 FIR NFT Awards: Category - Metaverse

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 16 Aug 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Today, we will discuss the results of the top metaverse projects with a special guest, Ogar. He originally worked in design and production in the video game and the esports industry for 10 years until he found his true calling in NFTs, blockchains, and the metaverse. Ogar launched his company in 2019, Ogar Production, to pursue his passion for alternative art that embraces the voxel atheistic. His work focuses on creating buildings and assets within the metaverse space, one block at a time! In this episode, we go through the various winners and discuss what makes them stand out, as well as the future potential and challenges for the metaverse space. We learn details about the winners, what Ogar thinks about the various projects, aspects that make each project special, the role of big corporations in the space, the value of indie projects, and much more! Tune in to hear from a leader and respected figure within this cutting-edge industry, Ogar!

Key Points From This Episode:

We learn how Ogar first started in the NFT space and what he is currently working on.
Background about Sandbox and why he thinks it is an interesting project.
What Ogar sees as the competitive advantage of Sandbox compared to similar projects.
How he thinks Sandbox can strike a balance between people and technology.
He shares what he thinks about the future potential and challenges are for Sandbox.
What the new OM project is and how Ogar would characterize it.
Whether OM will be able to meet the promises of users and be sustainable.
Discussion about the narrative of OM and how it is beneficial to scaling the project.
Learn about Cryptovoxels and what makes it different to other metaverses.
Aspects that he enjoys the most about Cryptovoxels and why he values it the most.
The vision that the developers of Cryptovoxels have in common with Ogar.
Some of the problems and challenges that Cryptovoxels may have in future.
Comparison of Cryptovoxels to other metaverses.
The characteristics of Cryptovoxels that makes it appealing to people.
How Ogar feels about Cryptovoxels’ focus on art within the digital space.
An overview of the winner of the vote: Decentraland.
Why Ogar thinks Decentraland won and what is the mass appeal.
Ogar gives us his opinion on the role of Facebook in popularising metaverse.
We end the show by finding out what Ogar’s favorite metaverse project is.

Tweetables:

“Whatever you deliver, you deliver it in a better world.” — @Dat_Ogar [0:12:56]

“I believe that the metaverse will be the one to clear the path and act like a laboratory of metaverse societies that will function under the development of decentralized contracts.” — @Dat_Ogar [0:24:22]

“In Cryptovoxels, I feel like there is more life and also feel that they did more to include people that didn’t have a lot of money or a lot of crypto, in order to push them to build.” — @Dat_Ogar [0:37:53]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Ogar on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

2022 FIR NFT Awards: Category - Artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 01 Aug 2022 01:00:00 +0800

In 2017, Jason Bailey immersed himself in the world of NFTs, with the hope of slowly shaping a better art world. Four years later, the industry exploded into the mainstream, and although it looks different from what Jason had imagined, the increased levels of access and democratization keep him passionate about, and inspired by, the space. Even before becoming involved with NFTs, Jason lived his life at the intersection of art and technology, with undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in art and 20 years of experience working for tech startups. For these reasons, we thought he would be the perfect guest to join us for a deep dive into the work of the winners of this year’s FIR Awards! Listen in as Jason shares his thoughts on artists Cath Simard, Deafbeef, Beeple, and XCOPY, and why the legacy of the NFT revolution will be the social change that it has brought about.

Key Points From This Episode:

An overview of Jason’s journey navigating the intersection between art and technology.
Jason’s entry into the world of NFTs in 2017, and how things have changed since then.
Motivation behind the founding of ClubNFT.
An introduction to the work of NFT artist Cath Simard.
The original crypto art collectors and what that bulk of new NFT collectors are buying.
Factors that make the work of Deafbeef unusual in the NFT space.
Thoughts on the accessibility of Deafbeef’s work.
How most of the traditional art world views NFTs, and why Jason disagrees.
Changes to the art world brought about by the NFT revolution.
Jason’s love/hate relationship with Beeple’s $69 million sale.
Exploring the work of XCOPY, the winner of the FIR Awards!

Tweetables:

“In NFTs, it’s not just that the art stands alone, but there’s also a sense that you can follow along with the artist, look up to the artist, or at least admire them for their principles and their approach.” — Jason Bailey

“[NFTs] really did, to some degree, democratize who gets to make art and ways of selling art and who feels comfortable collecting art. We probably have more art collectors today than we’ve ever had in history, and maybe more artists selling work than we’ve ever had in history.” — Jason Bailey

Jason Bailey

Floor Is Rising

2022 FIR NFT Awards: Category - PFPs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 25 Jul 2022 09:00:00 +0800

For today's show we welcome back Brandon Buchanan, to discuss the intriguing results of our 2022 NFT Awards where we surveyed friends of the show and look at the top four PFPs.

This category of the awards was by far the most popular, receiving more votes than any other. And we have to be honest, there were some surprises! We get to hear some really interesting perspectives from Brandon on our top four projects, Doodles, Nouns, Bored Ape Yacht Club, and CryptoPunks. We discuss Pharrell Williams' involvement with Doodles, how Bored Ape Yacht Club rewrote the playbook for NFTs, the unusual roadmap that Nouns have created for themselves, and why CryptoPunks are still the most important player in the history of the game.

Key Points From This Episode:

Building a brand beyond the world of NFTs; Brandon's thoughts on funding and investment.
Weighing Pharrell Williams' decision to come on board with Doodles and what this means.
Nouns' daily options and the implications of this relating to pricing and demand.
Looking at the Nouns trajectory and the long horizon they have laid out.
Board Ape Yacht Club's serious impact on the PFP sphere, and their polarising status.
Misunderstandings about the way that Bored Ape flipped the crypto playbook.
Considering the influence of fashion, memes, and more general rules of branding.
Why CryptoPunks are the Michael Jordan of the NFT PFP space!
Thoughts on the role of the CryptoPunks founders and why they broke the mould.

Tweetables:

“I like that we are moving away from this idea that PFPs are just there to flex. I like this idea that NFTs can be a gateway to community, a gateway to participating in governance.” — Brandon Buchanan [0:07:14]

“I think Bored Ape's contribution to the NFT space, particularly with the the PFPs has to be revered, they have done so much across the board.” — Brandon Buchanan [0:33:51]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:s

Brandon Buchanan

Brandon Buchanan on LinkedIn

Lucas Pontes - Fingerprints DAO, RAW DAO, NFT collector DAOs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 20 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Show Notes.

Just as NFT technology has disrupted the way art is commercialised, so too is it disrupting the way art is curated. Joining us today to break down the role of curatorial DAOs is Lucas Pontes. Lucas is part of Fingerprints DAO and RAW DAO, in this episode, he fills us in on the greatest issues NFT collector DAOs face, as well as the solutions they aim to solve. We discover the parallels between the traditional art world and the NFT art world, in terms of legislation and curation, as well as the novel, decentralised curatorial system of RAW DAO and its subsequent challenges. Lucas predicts the evolution of the DAO as a format, before delving into NFT photography and what it means for the traditional photography space. Tune in to find out more about all things DAO, and how curation competence is ensured in the ever-evolving world of NFTs!

Key Points From This Episode:

How Lucas Pontes got into NFTs and how he got involved with Fingerprints DAO.
Lucas explains Fingerprints DAO and his role in the DAO.
The biggest issue with NFT collector DAOs: the unclear business model.
Fingerprints DAO’s current business model and brand attributes.
The solution Fingerprints is selling to NFT collectors.
The balance between the DAO as a format and the art itself in terms of creating, retaining, and returning value.
The novel and decentralised curatorial system of RAW DAO.
The meticulous art-centred curatorial process of Fingerprints.
How DAO members make decisions about acquisitions.
The similarities between gallery and DAO acquisition processes.
The parallels between the traditional art world and the NFT art world.
The challenges of the decentralised curation model and ensuring curation competence.
Fingerprints DAO’s plans to stray from solely Ethereum acquisitions to include real-world acquisitions.
The impact of the NFT market on photography.
The criteria by which RAW DAO deems a piece of NFT photography valuable.
Lucas’ prediction of the evolution of the DAO as a format.
How NFT technology disrupted the way art is commercialised.
The differences between photography NFTs and traditional photography.
Lucas’s favourite artists.

Tweetables:

“Perhaps the biggest issue with collector DAOs is there isn’t a very clear business model.” — @lucasponn

“The main purpose of [Fingerprints DAO] is fostering the best collection that we can.” — @lucasponn

“In RAW DAO there is a more decentralised curatorial system in place, which is quite interesting.” — @lucasponn

“As much as people rely on experts, you can’t just say anything is art.” — @lucasponn

“There are a lot of parallels that can be drawn between the traditional art world and the NFT art world. At the end of the day, it’s still a bunch of people in art and you’ve still got the same problem of figuring out what is valuable and what isn’t.” — @lucasponn

“If the curatorial process is entirely open, you’ve got to make sure that there isn’t a way for people to go into it and sway it to their will.” — @lucasponn

“There is a big conflict between what is popular and what is good, and divergence within that. That is not going away with the technology.” — @lucasponn

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Lucas Pontes on Twitter

Fingerprints DAO on Twitter

RAW DAO on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

Cole Sternberg - "Crossing Over" from Contemporary Art to NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Show Notes

Cole Sternberg is a critically acclaimed contemporary artist who is now entering the world of NFTs. His first NFT drop was on June 10th and in this episode, we hear about the broader concept of his work and how it manifests through the process of relinquishing control to code. Cole fills us in on what it is that he loves about generative work, and why he chose to embrace the technology tied to NFTs rather than simply turn his physical art into jpegs. We also find out more about the differences between the physical art world and the NFT world in terms of ranking and collector trends, interactions, and expectations. As a ‘crossover’ artist, if you will, Cole explains the dynamic (and the thrill) of exploring the new medium of NFTs, as well as the digital literacy gap between physical art and the NFT space. Tune in to hear about Cole’s exploration process, how his themes of human erasure manifest in his NFT works, and how NFTs act as a commentary on society!

Key Points From This Episode:

Why Cole Sternberg chose to enter the NFT world via Art Blocks.
Cole’s choice to embrace the technology tied to NFTs, rather than turn physical art into jpegs.
The themes of his work: erasure of the human hand, and the earth itself as a composer.
How his upcoming NFT collection addresses these themes in the digital form.
What Cole loves about generative work.
How it feels to relinquish control to code versus nature.
Cole’s learning process of thinking more abstractly and getting to his imagined final product.
How interactions with collectors differ in the physical art world versus the NFT world.
Why ranking NFTs according to their floor price is detrimental.
How NFT curatorial concepts can (and should) evolve.
The crossover dynamic of established contemporary artists moving into the NFT space.
The digital literacy gap between the physical art world and the NFT world.
NFTs as a commentary on society.
Speculation on how Light and Space artists would have approached NFTs.
Cole’s favourite artists!

Tweetables:

“All these different things emerge when you expose paintings physically to the elements.” — @colesternberg

“That broad idea of erasing the human hand and giving it back to the earth, I wanted to address that in the digital form.” — @colesternberg

“There’s not much transparency in the physical art world but there’s basically infinite transparency in the NFT world.” — @colesternberg

“There’s an inherent crossover that should be irresistible to most artists.” — @colesternberg

“It’s a crazy thing that a medium can come over a few-year period, tops, and become so prevalent in the world and in the market.” — @colesternberg

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cole Sternberg on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

NFT crosschain - The Teleportation Paradox - Drew Beller, Prateek Shah - Spanning Labs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 06 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Today on the Floor Is Rising Podcast we are joined by Prateek Shah and Drew Beller, the two Co-Founders of Spanning Labs, to speak about what their company is offering the world of NFTs and why artists and collectors should be excited about the expansion of possibilities they are bringing to the space. We get to hear all about the company and how our guests made their way to the advent of this project before we dive into their vision for cross-chain interoperability and the practicalities of what this will mean when they launch publicly early next year. Along the way, we cover some interesting ground, hearing from Drew and Prateek about the lessons in consensus the blockchain space has taken from robotics, what they see on the near horizon for the NFT markets, some of their competitors, and how they differentiate themselves, and a little about the architecture of their solution. So, in order to hear all about an exciting addition that might be the answer to your needs, be sure to press play!

Key Points From This Episode:

Our guests' backgrounds and journey into their current roles working in the NFT realm.
Cross-pollination between robotics and the blockchain space.
Spanning Labs' solution for cross-chain interoperability.
Detailing how ownership changes in NFTs under the Spanning Labs NFT framework and what is meant by 'moving owners around'.
The intricacies of blockchains like Solana and how the Spanning network fits into these transactions.
Potential changes to the NFT landscape in the next few years, with increasingly lower barriers to entry.
More power and control for creators to make decisions about their art.
Drew and Prateek's perspectives on competition in their section of the market.
Differences between Spanning Labs and competitive solutions such as LayerZero.
Integration with OpenSea and how Spanning NFTs can be deployed and function.
An explanation of multi-chain addresses in the current climate.
Adoption strategies from Spanning Labs in the context of the bear market.
The modular architecture of Spanning, and what this enables for transfers.
Where and how to learn more about Spanning Labs!
Drew and Prateek's favourite NFT artists and projects, and what they are most excited about on the horizon.

Tweetables:

“There won't be one blockchain to rule them all, but there might be one blockchain that's the best at payment processing.” — @DrewBeller

“It's really important to us that an NFT is always owned by the user.” — @DrewBeller

“The important thing to keep in mind is that it's not possible for a contract to meant to be deployed locally to interact in a multi-chain way.” — Prateek Shah

“I am really looking forward to seeing more changes in the generative art space, specifically how we can start generating art on-chain.” — Prateek Shah

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Spanning Labs

Prateek Shah

Drew Beller on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

P1xelfool - Lo-fi conceptual generative artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 30 May 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Episode 66: Show Notes.

Today we have a great chat with generative artist, p1xelfool, about how NFTs became his main practice and source of income, and his philosophy towards the evolution of the art world. p1xelfool tells us about his focus on the feelings that art can evoke, and why he values these over intellectualisation and representation. We also discuss why making his work look distinctly digital is a central part of what he does at the moment, and how his path diverged from his focus on a more classical painting practice. As a relative newcomer to the world of NFTs, p1xelfool's story is one that many artists might relate to; we speak about the possibilities of the future, what it means to stand out in these burgeoning and sometimes overcrowded spaces, and where and who he draws most of his inspiration from. To hear it all from this great guest, join us!

Key Points From This Episode:

p1xelfool's route into the world of NFTs and the part that using Bitcoin played.
The decision that p1xelfool had to make between pursuing generative art and painting.
p1xelfool's innate attraction to obsolete technologies and low-resolution work.
The market's appreciation of difficult mediums such as generative art.
A look at the tools that are used in p1xelfool's creative process.
Thoughts on 'concrete' and abstract generative works and why our guest shifted gears in his latest project.
The challenge of standing out in the digital realm; how our guest approaches catching viewers attention.
p1xelfool's thoughts on the current stage of his career and hopes for the future.
The big influence that Nicolas Sassoon has had on p1xelfool's work and attitude.

Tweetables:

“I have always loved the idea of playing with obsolete technologies.” — @p1xelfool [0:05:40]

“One of the things that I like about low-resolution works is that it is very restrictive, and I see that as a challenge.” — @p1xelfool [0:09:12]

“When I started p1xelfool, I decided that I wanted to create something that is more sparkly, in some way.” — @p1xelfool [0:12:27]

“I try not to represent anything. What I try to do is somehow evoke feelings or try to examine the feelings that a work brings in.” — @p1xelfool [0:14:40]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

p1xelfool

p1xelfool on Twitter

Nicolas Sassoon on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

Hemba - Earliest largest cryptopunk holder -> controversial founder of "V1 Cryptopunks"

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 23 May 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Welcome to the podcast Floor is Rising. During today’s conversation, we are visited by special guest Hemba, a famous collector in the CryptoPunks community. He is the founder of CryptoPunks V1 and tells us the story of how he claimed his first Punk and became the largest punk holder. Next, we dive into the history of the CryptoPunks trading market, the “hack” that led to the “hard fork”. Hear Hemba tell the drama filled lore of his journey in the crypto punk community and why he believes the story needs to be told. Thanks for tuning in!

Key Points From This Episode:

Welcome to today’s guest, Hemba, founder of CryptoPunk V1.
The story of how he got into NFTs.
How he claimed his first punk and realised what he was up against.
The story of how the cryptopunk trading market started and how you can look back on the early Reddit posts to see the energy around even small amounts being spent.
How he “hacked” the original cryptopunk contract that led to a “hard fork”.
The 82 transactions that were completed before the second Cryptopunks contract, of which 69 were Hemba.
How he ended up selling all of his punks by 2020
How he came to start CryptoPunk V1 and collaborated with Frank to create the V1 wrapper.
Why he believes the CryptoPunk story needs to be told.
Why he believes that the cryptopunk community needs to unite rather than fighting each other as the best way forward.
How Yuga buying Cryptopunks affected the rights you have as holders of the token, to freely trade, exhibit, and trade.
His focus on education, installations, and events, and why he believes CryptoPunks are an important part of art history.

Tweetables:

“I think the CryptoPunk story must be told, and the CryptoPunks community must come together to share it.” — @soldthebottom [0:33:57]

“The path forward is finding some kind of acceptance and peace. Really I think this is an opportunity for the whole community of Punk lovers to go, this is our chance to do something with CryptoPunks.” — @soldthebottom [0:38:27]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Hemba on Twitter

Floor Is Rising

MetaKovan - Beyond the "Beeple Sale"

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 16 May 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Episode 65: Show Notes.

MetaKovan made history by kicking off the biggest NFT boom by purchasing the most expensive NFT on record, Beeple's 'The First 5000 Days'. MetaKovan is also the founder of the Metapurse Fund, and NFT studio and investment fund, and we get to talk to him today, hearing all about his philosophy, current projects, and where he sees the world of art and NFTs heading in the near future. Our guest shares some really thought-provoking views on the societal functions of art, where art's value really lies, and why personal relationships with pieces of work are so important. For MetaKovan, art is all about experience and interaction, and he sees the hoarding and private storing of important pieces as a waste and misuse of their power. So to hear it all from a truly central member of this new world, be sure to join us for this great episode!

Key Points From This Episode:

Thoughts on the power of crypto and art as equalising forces in the contemporary world.
MetaKovan’s decision to invest in Beeple and the process of consideration.
Issues with infrastructure for artists outside of the western context.
The long-term impact of MetaKovan’s groundbreaking purchase.
What most excited MetaKovan’s about purchasing a piece of art from Beeple.
Evolving attitudes about the role of the artist and the growth of the idea of creators as designers.
Commission and co-creation; how MetaKovan fits into the NFT ecosystem.
MetaKovan unpacks his assertion about the public utility of art.
How MetaKovan sees money and the Metaverse developing in the coming years.
MetaKovan shares his favourite up-and-coming NFT artist and the excitement he has about them!

Tweetables:

“Art has this nature where its value, that accrues to the art itself, is very different to the market.” — @MetaKovan [0:04:30]

“How does art become valuable? In a lot of ways it's the story, it's how people hold it over time.” — @MetaKovan [0:04:58]

“That's where I am now, thinking about how do we make sure that use this phenomenal change that has happened in a way that is sustainable, and has lasting impact.” — @MetaKovan [0:06:02]

“In a few years, I'll be really proud if I am able to buy art from different parts of the world.” — @MetaKovan [0:12:51]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Metakovan on Twitter

Metapurse Fund

'The First 5000 Days'

Beeple

Floor Is Rising

Floor Is Rising on Twitter

Mark Soares - Tezos NFT ecosystem post Hic Et Nunc "incident"

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 09 May 2022 09:00:00 +0800

FIR with Mark Soares

On today’s episode of the ‘Floor Is Rising’, hosts Sabre Tooth (Professional NFT Collector) and Kizu (A Professional Art Critic) talk with guest Mark Soares, CMO/Founder at Blokhaus, a Marketing Agency, associated with the Tezos Blockchain, discusses NFTs and Tezos.

Episode Highlights

01:19 – Mark shares the story of how he became aware of NFTs.
04:40 – Around April, and May 2021, it started taking off in terms of people's realization that there's a carbon footprint to Ethereum.
06:38 - After Hic et Nunc took off In May 2021 they started looking at opportunities with institutions, Art Fairs, and Art Basel.
08:25 – A lot of people don't realize that the teams that work within the Tezos Ecosystem are long time Tezos nerds.
13:00 – It's hard to kill a platform that's decentralized, or that's built in a way that can be redeployed seamlessly.
15:25 – After HEN was rugged, the team were kind of in limbo, trying to determine how, and where we are going to drive traffic to for the artists because they had their work there.
17:30 – People are asking where are the NFT stored? Are you building it? Can I still access it? Those are really important questions to answer, mentions Mark.
19:30 - It's interesting in terms of how different categories of arts receive work and what is being sold.
21:15 – Can we solidify the rules of engagement when you're selling for a use case, and not necessarily selling the work itself.
26:31- It's a big selling point for Tezos as a brand and as an Ecosystem to have all these. All these cool people are creating amazing artwork.
28:25 – Sabre enquires that there's an indie side and then there’s a lot of corporate stuff going on so how does Mark coexist not just now but going into the future?
32:50 – Mark refers to the NFT of a large global brand like Coca-Cola as an example.

Two Key Points

There are three things that make Tezos attractive to do NFTs on and it's important from a positioning standpoint. Number one is little transaction fees, number two is the energy-efficient story, and number three is on-chain governance, which allows you to self-upgrade and evolve.
Mark feels that the two camps have to coexist (Corporate and Artist camp) both provide different use cases. The corporate camp is more driven towards utility and it's more of the architecture or the infrastructure of the NFC that's attractive to them as a means of engaging their very large user bases. Then there is the artist’s community which really started the whole NFT movement, and they want to preserve the authenticity and the creativity of the artwork, and many of them don't want to add too much utility or even consider it because they want it to be Art. You have to educate each one or at least engage with each one and solve problems for each one.

Tweetable Quotes

“It's the first true web3 use case ever that actually shows the strength of web3.” - Mark Soares
“It goes to show how passionate the artists are on Tezos that they won't let this thing fade away.” - Mark Soares
“We're able to accommodate but it actually did create a little bit of chaos for us for a few days.” - Mark Soares
“If you build the marketplace like ‘Hic Et Nunc’ was built, you don't have a problem. Other marketplaces might have a problem.” - Mark Soares
“Looking at the category of photography, this is a very savvy from a legal standpoint.” - Mark Soares
“The majority of artists that were on boarded early to Tezos was by virtue of not having to pay 200$ to an NFT.” - Mark Soares
“Tezos can also fork but the beauty of it is that it does not have to, it can do things without forking.” - Mark Soares
“Utility is important but I think if you ask the artists’ community, a good chunk of them will say, I don't want utility on my artwork to be the artwork.” - Mark Soares

Resources Mentioned

Floor is Rising: Website Twitter Apple

The Grail Thesis NFT fund - Meta4 - Brandon Buchanan

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 05 May 2022 01:00:00 +0800

Brandon Buchanan

On today’s episode of ‘Floor Is Rising’ podcast, hosts Sabre Tooth (Professional NFT Collector) and Kizu (A Professional Art Critic) talk with guest Brandon Buchanan, Founder and Managing Partner at Meta4 Capital, been in crypto a long time and now running an NFT fund. He explains why the Grail Thesis of investing in NFTs is the way to go.

Episode Highlights

00:58 – Brandon shares how he got into NFTs and also how he came to found the Meta4 NFT Fund.
03:15 –They've been trying to acquire the best assets, and most innovative and important collections dating back all the way to 2014.
05:25 - Michael Jordan rookie card is considered a Grail and they certainly have some of those in NFT’s space.
07:35 – Crypto Punks certainly continue to be, if not the top collection of all time, they are still amongst the top. So from a number’s perspective, it's still there, says Brandon.
09:20 – Brandon says, when they first put out the Bored Apes, even they themselves would admit that they didn't think the project was probably going to be as big as it is now.
11:48 - When they were mapping out the deployment of the fund, a lot of it meant doing this retrospective of NFTs to show where they've been, where they are now, and where they could potentially be headed.
13:35 – Brandon wanted to have their own internal tools that they can use to be able to execute such a strategy.
15:00 - When you look at the earlier NFTs like Rare Pepe or a Crypto Punk. They'd be very hard-pressed to say that's a security, but that is essentially a form of digital art or digital collectible, states Brandon.
17:35 - There's just something so beautiful about hearing the base that everything else is built on top of, and it's the same way with NFT's.
19:25 – There is just a ton of demand for new launches, and new projects that people want to get on the ground floor.
21:34 – Brendon thinks, if they didn't make that purchase, then at the outset, they probably could have gotten it for somewhat a bit of discount today.
23:14 - Brendon talks what NFT projects are right now seems to be pretty fairly valued.
25:35 – Sabre enquires, who these individual institutions are who will come into the NFT space?
30:02 - We do need to De-Risk and help with UX, UI way so that people can interact with NFTs and that’s all part of the process.
32:00 – Media is definitely going to play a more prominent role over the next several months in educating the market.
34:00 - Brendon shares about his favourite NFT Artist and his favourite NFT collection.

Two Key Points

Once you get into this realm, where you are doing Airdrops, where there is an expectation from the consumer that they're going to profit based on the efforts of the folks that are running the enterprise, you start to get in a grey area of what's the security or not. Even artists that now we're seeing, use NFTs as a tool to essentially raise capital.
Brandon highlights that we've entered a different realm of expectation that folks want their collections to evolve, that now it's bigger than the art they want to be a part of a cool community. It becomes a sort of reflection of the kind of who you are. He thinks that's a powerful driver.

Tweetable Quotes

“With NFTs, I kind of always had this philosophy or thesis around the tokenization of everything.” - Brandon Buchanan
“Some collectors have stuck to an opposite thesis that it's better to collect floor pieces rather than those super rare pieces.” - Sabre Tooth
“By having these grails, we're essentially having historical artifacts or digital antiquity.” - Brandon Buchanan
“Provenance in the history, for me, that is very important.” - Brandon Buchanan
“There have certainly been moments where I felt like we may be overpaying but the fact that you want a particular specimen, kind of mandates that you make a certain purchase.” - Brandon Buchanan
“Rare Pepes we believe are undervalued.” - Brandon Buchanan
“Most things end up getting fairly priced.” - Brandon Buchanan
“NFTs now have a very prominent voice in terms of helping people identify both collections that should be paid attention to as well as new artists.” - Brandon Buchanan

Resources Mentioned

Floor is Rising: Website Twitter Apple
Brandon Buchanan: LinkedIn Website Twitter

Jordi Alexander - NFT market crystal ball gazing

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0800

FIR with Jordi Alexander

On today’s episode of ‘Floor Is Rising’, hosts Sabre Tooth (Professional NFT Collector) and Kizu (A Professional Art Critic) talk with guest Jordi Alexander, Game Theorist and 1st Principles Thinker, CIO of Selini Capital & Advisor to many NFT Projects, All-around games expert, and former poker player who has a lot of opinions on things to Crypto. He shares his opinions on a variety of subjects related to NFT's.

Episode Highlights

01:45 – Jordi shares how he got into Crypto and his first introduction to NFTs.
03:35 - There's a lot more psychology involved behind thesis in NFTs, says Jordi.
05:35 – Sabre and Jordi discuss the BAYC flipping of the Punks pfps.
07:25 – Jordi talks about the two things that he finds interesting in his current role.
09:38 – Jordi thinks a lot about the fragmentation of liquidity and what does that end game look like?
12:28 – Kizu asks if the community is driving the price or if the price is driving the community.
14:07 – The best practice that most people think of in the NFT space is post hoc rationalization. This is valuable because it increased the price thus, it is now valuable.
16:00 - The price has been a reflection of what has gone right and what has gone wrong, states Jordi
17:35 – Jordi explains the concept of risk-adjusted investing.
19:54 – Jordi discusses NFT from a legal and security perspective.
22:17 - There are arguments to be made that they are securities and this creates a lot of legal battles that are going to have to be fought, highlights Jordi
24:00 – The NFT being part of the community, it is good if you reward people in that NFT community. If they're being active in the community, you want to give them something that's the very basic thing.
26:11 – When you add financial incentives to a particular game design or game mechanic that didn't have that before, it turns into completely something else.
29:33 – Jordi expresses his view on how he feels about attempting to dethrone the open sea situation that probably will play out in the next few years.
32:43 - We will have wallets specially designed for NFTs where we’ll have our wallet address and for all the other EVM chains and everything else that exists, states Jordi.
34:35 - It's a little bit of a circular thing where people are paying fees to themselves to get a slightly higher percentage of rewards, mentions Jordi.
36:22 – Jordi is very curious to see how digital artists start to create modes for themselves where their art cannot be as easily replicated and that is quite sustainable.
38:00 – Jordi shares about building community when it is one on one.
40:00 - The benefit of NFT is that everybody can look at it. It's not like it's locked up somewhere. Everybody's looking at the creation and there is the status aspect as well.
42:00 – Jordi suggests people look at NFT as real estate and when he wants to invest in real estate, he is looking for things that are not easy to replicate.
45:15 – Jordi talks about his favorite NFT project of artists.

Three Key Points

There are always going to be people who are looking at the market and saying which one is the most expensive, that's going to show people the most status and they just want to buy that one and don't care if it's pixelated or if it's an ape, there is a clear catalyst that just drives price forward, and that is price.
Jordi explains that the gaming side is a whole different element where NFTs just fit in very nicely in terms of the ownership of items. We don't necessarily need to create a whole new structure there. It's just exactly what it used to be where we would have some rare item in the game and now, we're just making that NFT so that it's much easier for people to move it around, sell it, own it, and feel like more ingrained with the game in that aspect. So apart from the gaming side, the social side of the social tokens is something that he finds most fascinating.
The technology will play a part in terms of creating ways to list NFT on multiple marketplaces at the same time, if we put it on looksrare and we’re not finding buyers from opensea or whatever 20 other platforms come up, there's going to be ways where we can still source all the buyers because as a seller, all we're trying to do is find a buyer that's willing to pay the highest price as soon as possible so that we can sell it. So, he thinks that technology will start to get upgraded, and this will play a transformative effect in many ways.

Tweetable Quotes

“I'm always amazed how some people get so tied up into a specific picture of a penguin.” - Jordi Alexander
“Those punks are not the Bitcoin of NFTs because they don't have quite the same provenance.” - Jordi Alexander
“You can level up your NFT, there's a gaming aspect to it as well and a social aspect.” - Jordi Alexander
“If somebody falls in love with their NFT they are still going to have some financial incentives.” - Jordi Alexander
“Price is just going to be a reflection of the culture in the long run.” - Jordi Alexander
“I don't think they made a bad investment. You just have to consider the downside with a lot lower.” - Jordi Alexander
“You have to maintain momentum and if you start losing a lot of momentum, it's kind of buried.” - Jordi Alexander
“I do see the centerpiece being the artist centerpiece, being the creator and creators themselves, driving the community. I see that as being the future.” - Jordi Alexander
“If you think there's some unique technology behind the NFT or a unique person behind it, that's something that you can at least follow.” - Jordi Alexander

Resources Mentioned

Floor is Rising: Website Twitter Apple
Jordi Alexander: Twitter

Kevin Abosch - OG best-selling NFT artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 19 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: Kevin Abosch

Welcome to the podcast Floor Is Rising with host SabreTooth, a professional NFT collector and Kizu, a professional art critic. On this podcast, we talk deeply about the business of creating, collecting and analyzing NFTs. So, if you’re a creator or collector of NFTs, jump in!

On today’s episode, SabreTooth and Kizu interview Kevin Abosch, an OG crypto artist. Kevin began formal practice as an artist 33 years ago. Beginning with digital photography, he explains his art as always have been at the intersection of art and technology. After getting publicity from a project he built in which users of the portal could communicate anonymously, he was approached by a number of Bitcoin wallet companies who wanted to acquire the same technology. This sent him into a deepdive on all things blockchain. In January of 2018, Kevin made his first big statement by tokenizing himself in the form of 10 million ERC-20 tokens. This idea for I AM A COIN came to him after many years of feeling commodified as an artist.

When Kevin released his book Bank in 2013, few people seemed to show interest in the subject matter. In fact, he explains, the mainstream is only just now beginning to show interest in crypto, which has previously been seen as an alien. For decades, digital art was very marginalized from the professional art world. Many early practitioners of digital art were not prolific and spoke the language of technology, which most traditional artists did not have in common. Art institutions are only growing interest in digital art now because of the monetary potential seen in the medium’s growing popularity. There is very little consensus on what crypto and NFT art means, though for Kevin it is simply a methodology of creation.

The traditional art world has been hesitant to accept pioneers of digital art, though they are slowly coming around. Kevin ultimately believes that if there is money to be made in this field, then those with money and in power positions will control the narrative, show, media and marketplace. They discuss trash art among other prominent “newer” art movements. Historically, we know that the art world loves a movement, as there is power in numbers. Among many NFT artists, it is clear that there is a lack of understanding regarding how their practice fits into the context of the tradition of making art for thousands of years. The “new” concepts, such as trash art and found art, have really been done for decades and are nothing new at all.

Kevin discusses his first major NFT project 1111. Though the amount of work it required nearly killed him, it was a satisfying and well received project overall. The most challenging thing, he recalls, was finding the ability to sit back and watch his work be commodified. He prefers to know that his work has made it into good hands and people are finding enjoyment in it. This is a space, he has learned, in which you have the ability to create your own reality. As the episode wraps up, he reveals his favorite artist.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

0:57 - Introduction to this episode and today's guest, Kevin Abosch

1:53 - Kevin’s background in art and cryptoart.

8:33 - The reception of Kevin’s 2013 work, Bank, and what has changed since then.

11:04 - The tensions between digital vs. contemporary art worlds.

19:25 - The future of traditional art worlds.

22:30 - Reflecting on trash art and other “new” art movements against the background of art.

28:11 - Kevin’s project 1111 and discussing the art collector dynamic.

35:30 - Kevin’s favorite artist,

Tags:

Crypto, cryptocurrency, cryptoart, crypto artist, NFT, digital toke, digital photography, photographer, artist, digital art, technology art, blockchain, cryptography, conceptual art, investors, startup, privacy, anonymous, bitcoin, bitcoin wallet, public and private keys, Ionia coin, ERC-20 tokens, openseed, contemporary art, media art, meme, digital art career, NFT art, art movements, twitter, trash art, traditional art, art collectors, discord

Links:

Learn more about Kevin Abosch.

Connect with Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Mario Gabriele - Writing article about Opensea->Starting a NFT project

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 14 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: Mario Gabriele

Welcome to the podcast Floor Is Rising with host Sabre Tooth, a professional NFT collector and Kizu, a professional art critic. On this podcast, we talk deeply about the business of creating, collecting and analyzing NFTs. So, if you’re a creator or collector of NFTs, jump in!

On today’s episode of Floor is Rising, host Sabre Tooth is joined by Mario Gabriele, founder of The Generalist and one of the best writers on the internet. He found NFTs last year, like so many others, through Twitter. He’s always been interested in crypto and understanding that world, so when NFTs popped off, it was a natural fit for him. The inflection point for him was when Apes hit the market. Writing a piece for The Generalist led him to buying and creating his own NFTs. He felt like there was a missed opportunity in the market because it was so aesthetic-based, and the source material wasn’t super deep. He wanted to view NFTs as a literary character and filter them less by aesthetic and more about their character.

It was this line of thinking that led him to creating Philosophical Foxes. Inspired by BAYC, he aims to build out the lore of his Foxes and wants to tell stories with them using novel technology. The market can be irrational and fickle, so he hopes his community and narrative are the measures of success he’s judged upon, rather than how much the price is. Of course he wants a triple hit in which the price is competitive, but he believes that comes after the success of the story.

The ultimate NFT bottleneck is the noise in the market. Many are cool projects, but Mario explains that there are also bad projects and scams out there. Literary projects, he believes, will be a slower burn as people begin to diversify their interest in NFTs. They want to infiltrate everything, film, media, digital, and more. He’s sure that some will be broad and hit all of those markets, but others may niche down to just eBooks, or instagram. The thing he’s currently most interested in is the immediate social capital given to NFTs.

One of the first things Mario did when creating Foxes is setting their values. One of the first ones was Philosophy not Floor. The people who have a bunch of Foxes are some of the best builders in the world, so while he wants to be literary and philosophical, he doesn’t want to be precious. Foxes are in the beginning stages, so he’s excited to move into the messy middle.

Lastly, Mario explains his current favorite artist is Dom Hoffman, and his work in Corruptions.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

1:00 – Introduction to this episode and today's guests

1:21 – How Mario got into NFTs

4:25– The missed opportunity in NFTs

7:36 – The hole FoxesNFTs fills in the market

9:37 - How Mario will measure the success of his NFTs

15:22 - The current bottleneck in NFTs

Tags:

Creating, collecting, analyzing, NFT, crypto, funds, portfolio, manager, products, field, Foxes, builders, unsustainable, effort, survive, backstories, interest, assess, development, alpha, beta, questions, whitepapers, project, games, analyze, process, data, tweaks, enhance, role, ecosystem, ambiguity, standpoints, metric, AI, philosophy,

Links:

Learn more about Mario Gabriele and The Generalist here

Connect with Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Sasha Fleyshman - Arca NFT portfolio manager - NFT gaming

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 07 Apr 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: Sasha Fleyshman

Welcome to the podcast Floor Is Rising with host Sabre Tooth, a professional NFT collector and Kizu, a professional art critic. On this podcast, we talk deeply about the business of creating, collecting and analyzing NFTs. So, if you’re a creator or collector of NFTs, jump in!

On today’s episode of Floor is Rising, host Sabre Tooth is joined by Sasha Fleyshman, Arca Chemist on Twitter and Portfolio Manager at Arca, one of the biggest brand names in crypto funds. The episode begins with Sasha talking about how he got into NFTs and became the portfolio manager at Arca. He began by helping to test the different products and shares how his unique skills and experience in gaming helped him in this field. He had always found it interesting and was an expert in the mechanics of it, which helped him grow in his knowledge and reach his current position. He also shares about his role in helping pitch ideas to the team and begin running new strategies on an institutional level.

Next, Sasha and Sabre discuss the differences between individuals buying NFTs versus institutions buying them. First, Sasha points out how everyone does it in different ways with different strategies. However, he encourages all buyers to look at the underlying project of the NFT as well as the relationship of the success of the profit to the success of the asset to help inform decisions. The NFT gaming sector has grown largely in recent years, and Sasha also discusses two of the leading factors in this growth, specifically in how Covid increased involvement.

Moving on to the specifics of the NFT gaming sector, Sasha next discusses the different ways that the playing fields are made even and fair. He also dives into the enhanced PvP mechanics of this field. These originally started out as unsustainable because of low effort games being put out into the field, however, Sasha shares his confidence that the games which build IP will survive and thrive. He lists some of the games about to be dropped soon which he has high hopes for and points out the importance of gaining attention from gamers through the creation of backstories.

Sasha then gives insight into how to assess a game’s solid IP. Because this field is still in the early stages of its growth and development, it can be difficult to truly assess them. However, he does discuss the benefits of looking for an alpha or beta, asking questions directly to the team, and reading whitepapers to make sure everything checks out. Another important key Sasha encourages listeners to look out for is how the assets correlate to the project. He gives some

examples of different games that struggled in this area and how it affected their quality and growth.

The episode continues as Sasha explains how they analyze and process data to implement different tweaks into the system to enhance it and make it better. He shares how it is a continual work in progress and how there is always growth to achieve: the ultimate goal is to take what you have learned and use it to make things better. Most importantly, he discusses the importance of knowing what the assets are and the role they play in the ecosystem, always reaching out about questions rather than relying on ambiguity, viewing it from different standpoints, and reflecting on the progress and data present.

Lastly, Sabre and Sasha reflect on the different AI used in these gaming systems and the ways it is implemented to enhance the games. Sasha specifically looks at how AI can be trained to develop and create unique assets for the games. The future is bright for AI, and Sasha tells of his excitement for what it has to offer in this field and in how these types of land will gain instrumental value. He concludes by sharing about some of the projects he has been a part of and some of the future games coming out that he is the most excited for.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

1:00 – Introduction to this episode and today's guests

4:05 – Difference in individuals versus institutions buying NFTs

7:00 – The growth of the NFT gaming sector

15:52 – Enhanced PDP mechanics

20:40 – How to assess a game’s solid IP

23:33 – How has Sasha’s analysis process changed over the past couple months

27:47 – Viewing the field from a metric standpoint

30:53 – Sasha’s View on AI and what it has to offer in the world of gaming

36:06 – Different projects Sasha has investigated that he likes and dislikes

Tags:

Creating, collecting, analyzing, NFT, crypto, funds, portfolio, manager, products, field, mechanics, individuals, institutions, success, asset, gaming, sector, growth, Covid, PDP, unsustainable, effort, survive, backstories, interest, assess, development, alpha, beta, questions, whitepapers, project, games, analyze, process, data, tweaks, enhance, role, ecosystem, ambiguity, standpoints, metric, AI, gaming, trained, developed, land, value

Links:

Learn more about Sasha Fleyshman and Arca here

Connect with Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Investing in Virtual Land - Market Structure and Usecases - PangeaDAO

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 29 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: PangeaDAO

On today’s episode, SabreTooth and Kizu interview the two pseudonymous founders of PangeaDAO, Punk8621 and Albert Wegener. As Albert and Punk explain, PangeaDAO is a collective of investors, artists, creators, builders, and people who want to create cool things in the metaverse and to gain exposure to different kinds of metaverse land ("land" that is perhaps better understood with the analogy of a software engineering SDK). PangeaDAO is designed to bring people together to acquire metaverse land and develop on it, creating revenue-generating ventures. The work of PangeaDAO is not all about revenue, though, but is about creating things of lasting value that benefit the community, as well as making an easy way for any individual or retail investor to get access to a diversified portfolio of metaverse land assets.

This focus on access works against the current barriers to entry for individuals and investors who are not associated with large companies, and intends to make the metaverse a more equitable space. The focus also represents the central concern that drove Punk and Albert to develop the plan for PangeaDAO in the first place. They describe their respective backgrounds in the NFT space, and how they arrived at the realization that people need relationships and networks in order to acquire metaverse land. Without ample funds and the right contacts, small retail investors have a disadvantage in their efforts to buy, and the advantages enjoyed by larger companies skew areas of the metaverse in their favor.

Given the fact that land is only as valuable as what you do with it, Punk and Albert established their cooperative in order to do something productive with land using a network of creatives. While big companies are currently snapping up land to hold as a revenue-generating asset, organizations like PangeaDAO intend to build gallery spaces, in-world games, and other such ventures that offer long-term value. While use cases like in-world games are currently popular in the metaverse, they are only the beginning. Punk and Albert expect the metaverse to shape the future of work and social media, and much more. The metaverse in general offers a place to connect, host, and bring in culture, and Punk and Albert expect that it is only the first iteration of the next version of the internet!

Even with all the efforts toward metaverse decentralization, its free market will always mean that there are winners and losers, as well as trends of gentrification. However, if a world constructed within the metaverse becomes unpalatable to those in it, people are free to simply leave it and build a new one. And the structure of the metaverse is such that buyers and builders stand to benefit from developing things that help others. With these realities in mind, Punk and Albert are excited about PangeaDAO's future! They explain the origin story of their team, and also share both about their steps to make the organization legally compliant and about PangeaDAO's financial structure and its commitment to avoid institutional investment income prior to public sale. PangeaDAO's pre-sale is intended to bootstep liquidity for its token launch, but to also maintain equity as the organization opens up to buyers. With equity in its launch and equity in its vision, those interested in getting into metaverse development can expect great things from PangeaDAO in the days ahead!

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

0:57 - Introduction to this episode and today's guests, Albert Wegener and Punk8621.

6:28 - The disadvantage a small retain investor has compared to a large company.

10:09 - PangeaDAO's legal status and currently popular metaverse use cases.

15:43 - What lessons can we learn about building a community with a greater sense of equity?

21:06 - On use of the word "land" and projections of additional metaverse land utility.

25:44 - PangeaDAO's team origin story, financial structure, and launch

Tags:

Pseudonymous, founder, collective, investor, artist, creator, builder, metaverse, land, revenue-generating activities, value, community, cooperative, retail investor, diversified portfolio, metaverse land assets, barriers to entry, equity, NFT, cost of entry, contacts, network, in-world game, decentralization, legal entity, use cases, internet, utility of land, developers, revenue-generating asset, gentrification, free market, user experience, SDK, financial structure, institutional investment, liquidity, token launch

Links:

Check out the PangeaDAO website for more on the organization and its core team.

Connect with Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Jenny Sutto - Tiktok Twins -> Head of Marketing ->NFT Podcast host

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 25 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: FIR - Jenny Sutto

On today’s episode, SabreTooth and Kizu welcome guest Jenny Sutto, aka “Jenny from the Blockchain” and host of the NFT Catcher Podcast. As the conversation begins, Jenny shares her background in the NFT space. It was her twin sister who introduced her to crypto in 2017, and to NFTs in 2020. Jenny’s first NFTs were a dozen cryptokitties and, shortly after, she got into NBA Top Shot quite early. Now, Jenny is fully immersed in the world of NFTs and is Head of Market for Evaluate Market. She decided to start making weekly update videos detailing what was happening in Top Shot and offer tips for beginners. She quickly gained subscribers and was offered the position with Evaluate. When she retired from making Youtube videos, her podcast began.

Before making her Top Shot videos on YouTube, Jenny was actually a content creator on TikTok. She speaks about the differences in making short vs. long term content and the ability for TikToks to draw people’s interest towards new things. Though short term content is overly flashy and doesn’t always show the whole story to things, it’s very nature of being attention-grabbing helps introduce more people to NFTs. Then, Jenny reflects on the NFTs about which she initially didn’t understand the hype, such as Bored Apes. She didn’t like the art or profile pictures of the apes which was her initial turn off.

Anyone can make a profit by flipping, but it takes a certain person to hold on to diamond hands until the end. SabreTooth shares his theory that people holding onto NFTs are similar to the hypebeast fashion community. Thus, the experience you bring with you into the NFT space will inform what projects you will get and diamond hand, and which you will not get and flip. Jenny herself got into Top Shot because she was already into Blockchain technology. She spent much time learning about crypto before ever putting any money into it. When you have been holding onto something for long enough, she reveals, it gets harder and harder to allow yourself to let go of it.

Many people are beginning to value their digital identity over their real life one. Jenny believes this is because you can have a bigger impact online and reach more people. For this reason it will likely become more popular to own things digitally because more people can see the things you have. The value of NFTs is largely dependent on the price and the aura around it. Patience and discipline are a huge part of being in this space. In closing, she shares her favorite artist.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

0:46 - Introduction to this episode and today's guest, Jenny Sutto

1:20 - How Jenny got into NFTs.

3:24 - Jenny’s progression to being immersed in NFTs.

7:00 - Short form vs. long term content.

13:28 - NFTs Jenny has been wrong about in the past.

18:41 - Diamond hand holders vs. flipping.

23:18 - The rise of the digital identity.

25:21 - The need for discipline and patience in owning NFTs.

28:02 - Jenny’s favorite artist.

Tags:

NFTs, Blockchain, Jenny from the blockchain, cryptocurrency, crypto, cryptokitties, NBA top shot, investment, investing, flipping, NFT Catcher Podcast, evaluate market, content creator, Youtube, TikTok, Twitter, NFT podcast, short form content, bored apes, minting, bored ape yacht club, pranksy, hypebeast, diamond hand holders, NFT flipping, supreme, digital identity, PFPs

Links:

Follow Jenny on Twitter and check out her podcast.

Follow Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Martin Lukas Ostachowski - Crypto Art Historian

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast: Floor Is Rising

Episode: FIR - MLO

On today’s episode, SabreTooth and Kizu welcome guest Martin Lukas Ostachowski (MLO), a crypto artist and crypto art historian who got his artistic start in painting before beginning to incorporate digital tools into his process and eventually shift to thinking digital first. Around 2017, Martin developed an interest in crypto (the technology more than the currency), and he looked for applications in the art space. As he moved his practice more digital, he began to develop a body of work with an educational tone that helped bridge the gap between complex emerging digital technologies and everyday people. Martin explains why he adopted clouds as an artistic focus, and then shares how he got into documenting the history of crypto art (first in a blog and then a list of milestones) because of his conviction that innovation in art requires a knowledge of what came before.

Moving forward, Martin and his hosts turn to the topic of definitions. Martin prefers the term "crypto art" to "NFT" or "NFT art," even though the former has fallen out of popularity. One of Martin's current projects centers on clarifying definitions relevant to digital art, and Martin is actively pushing for the use of "crypto art" because of its wide and interesting meaning. The terms also feed into a discussion of how digital art relates to traditional art, and after commenting on this relationship, Martin explains the good that crypto art brought to the general art space as well as the belief he holds that there is a way for crypto art to break into traditional art.

This way exists even though the pariah of the digital art world - NFT - has been given its own world. We are currently in the eye of the NFT tornado, but in light of the whole scope both of digital art history and Martin's own history as an artist, he testifies to the evolution that continually takes place. NFT isn't everything, and there are many examples of past works with a far greater scope than what NFT can boast. Since art evolves in a cyclical manner, Martin believes that not only will we see other work with a broad scope come to the fore, but that we will remember and come to value older work and artists that are currently overlooked.

Even as the digital art space has morphed, different camps of artists have gained prominence: those who became influential through crypto/NFT art, and those who gained fame through other art avenues before entering the crypto/NFT art space. If crypto art is to be the inclusive movement it aims to be, both groups must be considered legitimate. Both groups must be able to contribute to crypto art history, and even artists whose work is controversial (like those in the Trash Art Movement) must be allowed to create. The space is dynamic, and doesn't stop; this fact should motivate artists to keep going! After briefly commenting on how he collects crypto art history, Martin wraps up the conversation with insight into his own current artwork and Alotta Money, an artist he wants to recognize.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

1:11 - Introduction to this episode and today's guest, MLO

7:24 - The term "crypto art" and the relationship between digital and traditional art

14:05 - The evolution of art, the eye of the NFT tornado, and Martin's shifting art

17:02 - Martin offers examples of projects with broad scopes.

24:26 - There are two camps of famous artists in the digital space and some controversial figures.

31:53 - Will more radical conceptual projects continue to be forgotten, or will we return to them?

39:05 - Martin shares about how he collects history, his own art, and an artist he wants to honor.

Tags:

Crypto artist, crypto art historian, painter, digital art, education, clouds, documentation, milestone list, term, definitions, NFT, NFT art, blockchain, technology, medium, traditional art, evolution, shift, project, remember, artist camps, inclusive, controversy, radial conceptual projects, repeated movements/waves, NFT archaeologist, physical exhibitions, art blocks

Links:

Check out MLO’s website for more on him and his work, as well as info on the historical projects he mentioned!

Learn more about Alotta Money.

Follow Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Jehan Chu - Unicorn - Crypto OG and Trad Art OG

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 18 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.floorisrising.com/jehan-chu-nft-investing/

On today’s episode SabreTooth and Kizu are joined by special guest Jehan Chu. Jehan is Chairman and Founder of Kinetic, a crypto VC firm, as well as Chairman and co-Founder of Social Alpha Foundation. Because of his background as an art dealer and his early involvement in NFTs, Jean is a perfect guest for the show.

Jehan’s interest in NFTs began through investing in Decentraland. His firm Kinetic was the first blockchain VC in Hong Kong and one of the earliest in Asia when they got started in 2016. Kinetic were seed investors in Decentraland, the first decentralized metaverse, in 2017. The company did much research on digital value and how it converted to real world real estate fundamentals and investment strategies. Jehan began his career as a front end developer before he was recruited by Sotheby’s, and transferred to Hong Kong in 2006. Two years later, he left the company and became an art dealer and advisor immersed in the contemporary art world. He identifies the three major pillars of art collecting: the critical importance of the artwork, the work’s market position and your personal relationship to it. These principles serve the same framework when applied to NFTs. Jehan became interested in crypto in 2013 and left the art world professionally in 2016, when he founded Kinetic.

Jehan considers PFPs to be collectibles, representative of community, self expression and membership, rather than fine art. While NFTs are creative and artistic, he doesn’t consider them to be art themselves. He reveals that the context for fine art is missing in the NFT space, because the NFT space is far too generalized, and the conflict between both sides is a result of misunderstanding on both ends. The institutions of fine art have been around for many years and are unlikely to be overrun now. Aside from influencer signaling, price is the only other reference for the value of an NFT.

As more PFPs come into play, engagement and commitments of communities often drop. As a result, the NFT world is on a very weak foundation. There needs to be a broader understanding of the cultural significance of NFTs to bridge the gap between NFTs and art. Elaborating on the tension between crypto artists and artists just joining the space who have made a name for themselves otherwise, Jehan reveals the world of NFT is not filled with artists, but designers. There must be education in the art schools to understand the tools and concepts of the NFT medium. As today’s episode draws to a close, Jehan highlights a few of his favorite artists in the space.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

0:44 - Introducing Jehan Chu.

1:23 - How Jehan got into the world of NFTs.

3:13 - The contemporary art world as a backdrop for NFTs

9:06 - Art vs PFPs

17:58 - What constitutes value for PFPs?

19:50 - Tension between traditional artists and crypto artists.

26:41 - Graphic design in the NFT world.

31:38 - Jehan’s favorite artists.

24:43 - Thanks to Jehan for joining us today

Tags:

NFT, cryptocurrency, art, design, art dealer, jehan chu, social alpha foundation, crypto, VC firm, kinetic, decentraland, blockchain, blockchain VC, hong kong, asia, seed investors, investing, metaverse, digital assets, cryptokitties, art world, traditional art world, front end developer, sotheby’s, contemporary art, art career, art collectors, PFPs, fine art institutions, cryptopunk, digital art

Links:

Connect with Jehan Chu.

Follow Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

Pixelord - Music NFTs and being an NFT artist in Russia

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.floorisrising.com/pixelord/

On today’s episode, SabreTooth and Kizu welcome guest Pixelord, whose decade-long music career has in the past year expanded into work with NFTs. Pixelord considers himself an audiovisual artist, bringing together music and images, and has been both collaborating on NFT ventures with fellow artists and developing his own NFT collection. He joins the podcast today to share about his background and art, his entrance into and thoughts on the NFT space, and how his identity as a Russian individual shapes his experience.

As the conversation begins, Pixelord overviews his recent move into the NFT space before diving more deeply into the dynamics of the transition through the lens of his nationality. He appeals to both Russian and more international, English-speaking audiences, but he found his audience shifted when he entered the world of NFTs. After all, the world of his music and that of NFTs naturally draw different crowds. Pixelord's music has long drawn audiences - many of them Russian - who resonate with his "vaporwave" aesthetic. The aesthetic is rooted in Pixelord's Russian heritage, and carries darker, dystopian, and melancholic vibes. The music incorporates a fusion of styles, but they are generally united by a sense of surreal nostalgia.

NFTs, on the other hand, catch the attention of artists, collectors, and people looking to make a profit. Conversations surrounding NFTs tend to take place on Twitter, and are international in nature (and so carried out in English). NFT buyers are mostly American and European, with Asian buyers also gaining a prominent place in recent days. The big collectors are not Russian, and the Russian art scene has simply not been very well penetrated by NFTs (or even use of Twitter!) at this point. Russians looking to access art have their own ways of doing so, and often would not have the money to spend on NFTs even if they were interested in doing so.

Moving forward, SabreTooth, Kizu, and Pixelord discuss the current NFT market. At this point, music NFTs have not been given as much attention as visual NFTs. While Pixelord notes that there is mixing of visual and musical components within NFTs, he also explains why he expects the presence of music in NFTs to grow and how he anticipates it will be incentivized. In the visual space, many collectors have collected NFTs for the appreciation of value, but for music, this has not been the case. Already, Pixelord sees other incentive systems in place and expects them to develop further; these systems, he says, include the ability to buy a music copy to sell later when a musician gains prominence, the option to buy a component of the rights to music, and the chance to work in musical collections (as Pixelord is doing now with his small collection of handmade NFTs). As the conversation wraps up, Pixelord shares a few of his favorite artists to spark listeners' interest in and exploration of NFTs.

Thanks for listening and don’t forget to subscribe and leave us a review!

Timestamps:

0:31 - Introduction to this episode and today's guest, Pixelord

2:42 - Pixelord offers thoughts on how his audience has changed.

5:48 - His "vaporwave" aesthetic

11:36 - His work has different receptions across Russian and other audiences.

14:14 - Why has the NFT market not penetrated Russia more?

19:04 - The conversation shifts to the topic of music NFTs.

21:58 - Many collectors collect visual NFTs for the appreciation of value.

26:43 - Pixelord's small collection of NFTs and his favorite artists

Tags:

NFT, music, collaboration, Russia, visual, audiovisual, audience, English-speaking, artist, collector, profit, value appreciation, vaporwave aesthetic, dystopian, melancholic, vibe, place, surreal nostalgia, fusion, reception, Twitter, NFT buyers, cryptocurrency, international, VK, affordability, music NFTs, visual NFTs, rights, royalties, copy, collections

Links:

Learn more about Pixelord and his work on Twitter, Foundation, and Linktree.

Check out Sound.xyz.

Follow Floor Is Rising on Twitter.

How to find investible NFTs - Business Times SG interview

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 10 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/lifestyle/nfts-finding-the-diamonds-among-the-duds

Interviewed for the article in Business Times above, full interview below

https://www.floorisrising.com/diamonds-among-duds/

NFTs: Finding the diamonds among the duds

10/03/2022 - 18:25

EXACTLY one year ago, a non-fungible token (NFT) artwork sold for US$69 million to a Singapore-based technopreneur. Since then, the NFT space has ballooned from a US$2 million market into a US$25 billion one, showed figures from market tracker DappRadar.

With millions of cartoon apes and pixellated characters to choose from, how do you find the best NFTs to hold or flip? Are there tools to select investment-grade NFTs? Is there even such a thing as investment-grade NFTs when many cultural establishments, such as museums, steer clear of them?

We speak with three experts who have been watching the space from the beginning:

Clara Che Wei Peh is an art curator best known for curating the groundbreaking NFT exhibition at Fine Art Storage Services in Le Freeport in 2021. She is also the founder of the Discord group NFT Asia, a community for Asian NFT artists with over 3,600 members.

Kizu (not his real name) is a Singapore art critic who has written for Wall Street Journal, ArtAsiaPacific, and other titles. While he's well-known in Singapore's art circles, he prefers to use the pseudonym Kizu when he co-hosts the NFT podcast Floor Is Rising.

His fellow co-host, Sabretooth (also not his real name), is a serial technopreneur who calls himself "a professional NFT collector". His publicly accessible NFT wallet contains over 1,000 NFTs.

(The interviews were conducted separately. But in the interest of brevity and clarity, they are merged here and edited to reflect the range of responses.)

Q: How does one pick investment-grade NFTs if one intends to hold them for long or flip them quickly?

Clara: Everyone has different criteria for buying NFTs they wish to hold. Some people would look at the reputation of the creative team and the artwork itself, whether the project has the potential to scale up and deliver value over time. Value can come in different forms - it could be, for example, a game that's really enjoyable; it could be further airdrops or tokens that can bring utility.

I think a lot of people would agree that you should look for projects you genuinely like. But if you're looking to flip something, you probably have to look at the hype that project has built for itself on the various media platforms.

However, what I've just described are the criteria for collectible NFTs. It's also important to state the distinction between collectible NFTs versus fine-art NFTs, because the markets for these look different. For fine-art NFTs, it's really about artists that you believe in and want to invest in over time.

Sabretooth: NFTs are such a new investment category that there is no consensus on what is an investment-grade NFT. There are huge portions of the population who think every NFT is a bubble or scam. And it's tough to call something investment-worthy if it has not been through multiple bull and bear markets, and survived.

And so, I look for things that have shown some kind of longevity in the market, even if the time frame, in the case of NFTs, is much shorter than in the stock market.

The physical artwork of CryptoPunk #7810, available for sale as an NFT, in the premier area at a CoinUnited cryptocurrency exchange in Hong Kong, China. Photo: Bloomberg

The other factor that I look at is historical and cultural significance. For example, there were two projects launched in 2017 - CryptoKitties and CryptoPunks. When CryptoKitties was launched, it was the biggest thing in the NFT world. It actually broke Ethereum with tens of thousands of people rushing to buy them. But fast forward to today, very few people are talking about CryptoKitties.

On the other hand, CryptoPunks had no hype when it was launched. It went through three-plus years of relative obscurity. But if you look at what's happening in the space now, with the multiple PFP (Profile Picture) projects being launched every day, you could say that the majority of the PFP market is a derivative of CryptoPunks. So its cultural significance has grown massively.

Now on to the issue of flipping: A lot of people think that if someone has a big social media following, they should take advantage of the hype and buzz to buy and flip those NFTs very quickly, usually in a matter of days.

In any investment class, there are always investors with all sorts of timeframes. Even for the bluest of blue-chip stocks, you have day traders. So a lot of the people buying NFTs right now are attracted by the potential for short-term profits, and they're not very comfortable holding these NFTs for long, in part because they're not sure about their long-term value.

Right Click + Save was a groundbreaking NFT exhibition curated by Clara Che Wei Peh in 2021 at Le Freeport, Singapore.

Q: Two of you (Clara and Kizu) are art critics who are familiar with the traditional art market. Are there lessons to draw from that market?

Kizu: I think it is a very useful counterpoint. The NFT market does have a lot in common with the art market as well as other financial markets. There are certain things that are perhaps resonant with the art market, such as price fixing, collusion, and pumping and dumping. But it's useful to think about the NFT market not as an extension of the art market, but really as a market that has its own kind of unique mechanisms and momentum.

One of the main things that may be familiar to art collectors would be the fact that the NFT market is also dominated by a very elite coterie of tastemakers and gatekeepers. Just as the art market can be swayed by individual collectors or a very small group of influential, say, New York collectors, the same thing can be said of the NFT market. People look out for the tastemakers who they know are going to move the needle and shift the market by what they buy and hold.

The twist here, however, is that we all know what's in the NFT wallets of these collectors, because all the wallets have a public address that can be looked up. So you can draw this whole network of correlations and adjacent purchases that will give you a lot of insight into what the whales (or the very influential collectors) are holding. You don't find that level of transparency in the art market.

Sabretooth: And there are tools out there that can aggregate this kind of wallet data so you don't have to go through them one by one. One of the best tools is Nansen. Other tools that are popular are icy.tools and moby.gg.

Clara: I think that having a good sense of the kind of cyclical pattern and market logic of the art market can help - for example, when we are thinking about how artists price their one of one (or unique) art NFTs, how they manage their price floor and strategy, or the option mechanisms on different NFT platforms (for example, Foundation uses 24-hour auction mechanisms). So if you are familiar with these different auction techniques, you may understand how the pricing may go, as well as how to, say, protect an artist's particular price floor.

When you have had experience with the contemporary art market, perhaps that would also help you decipher what is just trending and what can potentially last, based on market behaviour.

Kizu: I think in contemporary art, we have the so-called legitimised art media which plays a very important role in generating a discourse around the art. In crypto, you don't have that legitimised media, be it websites or magazines. What you have are things like, well, our podcast. In crypto, it is much more informal . . . Information and intel are disseminated almost entirely online, on Twitter, Discord and other socials.

The other thing that's missing is the institutional endorsement. You don't find NFTs in established museums, which is partly why NFT collectors such as Metakovan set up their own virtual museums.

Q: Some people have criticised NFT art for being rather basic. For instance, CryptoPunks are simple pixellated images of characters. What do you think of their criticism?

Sabretooth: To judge an NFT by its image is like judging a movie by a screenshot. The image is just one part of the NFT. The visual representation of CryptoPunks may be these pixellated 8-bit images that appear like a screenshot. And that screenshot alone is worth nothing.

What you have to understand is that a CryptoPunks NFT is a smart contract embedded in a marketplace that has permission-less bidding, buying and selling. So if you look at the project, all these cute little 8-bit pictures are manifestations of an ownership of that smart contract with an internalised marketplace built into it. And so I'd say if you want to evaluate the artistic merits of CryptoPunks, you can't do that unless you actually look at the code and understand the technical underpinnings of this project.

KIzu: I personally think that when the dust settles, it will be things like CryptoPunks that will hold their value. While CryptoPunks does not seem visually innovative - they're basically avatars with different traits - it is culturally significant. It came at a moment where these more medium-native projects were not really on the radar. But in hindsight - and we're only five years out - it was an epoch-defining project.

The BIOS: Living NFTs project (above) by Ernest Wu and Jake Tan. PHOTO: Hatch Art Project.

Q: Are there particular artists, collectives or projects that you recommend?

Clara: I'm wary of recommending specific projects because of my position as founder of NFT Asia. But if it can be framed in the light of projects I'm personally interested in or recently acquired, one of them would be the BIOS: Living NFTs project (above) by Ernest Wu and Jake Tan. It's something they've been researching for quite a long time. But also because I am friends with Ernest, I have a good understanding of how much work they've put in to game its smart contract capabilities and "on chain-ness" appeal.

Kizu: If I may plug something I'm involved in, together with a New York-based team, we recently launched Project Bullies: NFT, a fitness-themed project that professional boxer Jake Paul has endorsed. One key selling point is that we pay a lot of attention to the long-term community building for the people who buy into the project - for instance, offering a token that returns some other value to them, and creating a community offline.

Sabretooth: Framergence is an innovative project in the generative art space. I see it as similar to the CryptoPunks versus CryptoKitties situation where this project basically came out in the shadows of Art Blocks, which was very hyped, with people paying all sorts of money for those generative art pieces.

But if you look at the mechanics and the code of these two projects, I find Framergence much more innovative. And if I were to do a bit of crystal-gazing. I think that time-generative projects will look more like Framergence than Art Blocks in future.

MIchael Gord - Renting virtual land for fun and profit

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 08 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.floorisrising.com/michael-gord-metaverse-landlord/

https://twitter.com/FloorisRising/status/1501128443903156226

Kaloh - Generative art thought leader

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 04 Mar 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.floorisrising.com/kaloh/

https://www.kaloh.xyz/

Christian Ogier - Art Market Manipulations and NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 18 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Notes to come;

https://www.floorisrising.com/art-market-manipulations/

https://www.sepia.fr/

Mitchell Chan - What does "The institutions are coming" actually look like in NFTs?

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 15 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Show notes Here;

https://www.floorisrising.com/mitchell-chan/

Les Borsai - NFT fund - How he invests in NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 11 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

https://www.floorisrising.com/les-borsai-nft-fund/

PolyAnnie – First? Adult content NFT Creator

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 08 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Notes here.

https://www.floorisrising.com/polyannie-porn-nfts/

Artist – Robness – How meme culture became NFT culture

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 04 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Longer notes to come - @robnessofficial - how meme culture became NFT culture - Which celebs coming in to NFTs are doing it the "right way". Why the secret anon drops that happened on #hicetnunc. WHY #ROBNESS TWEETS ALL CAPS ALL THE TIME?

Collector: Carlini8 NFT OG – NFT Boxes – Purrnelopes

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 09:00:00 +0800

New Episode - OG NFT degen @carlini8N

explains how his personal philosophy on NFTs which led to his split with #PranksyNFT and leaving #NFTBoxes to start #purrnelopescc.

Sutu, Neonz & Metaverse

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:00:00 +0800

New episode - @sutu_eats_flies

joins us to discuss #NEONz and the #Sutuverse, an indie metaverse he's creating in opposition to VC and corporate funded metaverses. We also talk politics and the time he was denied entry to the US cos of TRUMP? o

Introduction to NFTs – Q&A – FAQ – Part 2

Floor is Rising Podcast — Wed, 19 Jan 2022 09:00:00 +0800

How can we classify the different works and styles within crypto art and NFTs?

We tend to think of the major art styles (impressionism, abstract expressionism, surrealism, etc.) as they relate to a visual structure or language. For crypto art this understanding has been somewhat alighted. In a way we can think of PFP projects as their own style because visually there is something in common, they work as a personal likeness or avatar. That being said most are just jpegs and not necessarily art that has been enabled by the blockchain.

Generative art however produces a certain aesthetic due to how that work is generated by code which could (somewhat) be classified as a NFT art style. Good examples of this would be OG artists like Eric Paul Rhodes or Tyler Hobbs, specifically his Fidenza series. In these cases, because of the algorithmic mechanism which is medium-native to crypto art, there are stylistic similarities which Kizu feels would classify as a major art style within NFT art.

Beyond this we also have things such as illustration or painting, which could be used as classifiers but these come from a time before crypto art and we can not really view or classify them in the same way. Moreover, those are merely techniques, which can be helpful for ranking skill level, but in the end that doesn’t really get to the point of why we classify art.

While Kizu and Sabretooth both acknowledge their level of cynicism, they bring up the idea that ultimately, art being classified is a biproduct of the market. Sabretooth talks about how collectors will buy a certain artists and then look for a narrative in which to place these artists. The reason being that, works are worth more if they are part of something bigger than just the work itself. Sabretooth finds that overall this effort has been unsuccessful in the sense that they have not been powerful enough to break through to the traditional art world. He gives the example of Beeple who has sold for ridiculous amounts of money, has a large fan base in the crypto community, but is not accepted by traditional art people.

Kizu talks about the use of of Punks as profile pics or RTFKT sneakers and the signaling of value in the metaverse, how we communicate, the transactions, etc. to point out that there is a narrative and it is about the money. He also draws a comparison between the NFT space and the art world of the 90s where, art from the developing world got recognized because there was a movement to promote these artists. It wasn’t really about their style or aesthetic rather their background and what they stood for.

What’s up with music in the NFT space?

Many major DJs are launching projects and that’s not a surprise as DJs and NFTs are both on the cutting edge of popular culture. Despite this, Sabretooth notes that music has stopped being the cutting edge of niche subcultures. Minority expressions don’t start in music anymore. There are cheaper or more viral ways such as creating a tiktok account. Because it has somewhat lost its power due to these mentioned elements Sabretooth feels that NFTs are ahead of music in creating subcultures and thus he is not as interested in the topic.

Could NFTs and smart contracts replace traditional contracts in business and real estate?

The idea of tokenizing real world assets has existed since 2016, it has not yet taken off nor does Sabretooth think it will. The reason why brings us to look at what is called the oracle problem - how do you bring data from off the blockchain on the blockchain and still have it be trustworthy? Especially in the case of real estate or other tangible items, the question moves to – if someone steals your NFT do they now own your house? The answer is generally, no, and if that is the case then, what is the purpose of putting it on the blockchain in the first place?

When you buy an NFT who owns the creative rights?

This brings up a big debate within the NFT space and the example of LarvaLabs gives us a good case study.

CryptoPunks Originally subscribed to the Nifty license which was created by DapperLabs (CryptoKitties) and stated that you could monetize your work up to $100k but that the original creators reserved the rights. Larvalabs later signed a contract with a talent agency in Hollywood and that agency then reserved the rights to make movies, games, etc.

As a response, a project named, CryptoPhunks, created an identical project as punks but facing right instead of left and then they made them all creative commons. This got them banned off of OpenSea but they just went and created their own marketplace. Their floor price is now above 1 ETH.

This example highlights the grand debate within the NFT space where many say that all NFTs should be a creative commons license where anybody can do what they like with the work. Cynically Sabretooth mentioned that this narrative could be being pushed because it benefits project owners.

How does a newbie start collecting NFTs?

Personally I would prefer to get a 1of 1 over a PFP project, something that I love looking at all the time and that I don’t mind if I can’t resale. Within that I would also like something that comes with a physical so that I could also hang it on my wall. What’s most attractive to me within the space is the ability to have so much more open access to artists and creations.

Because on low gas prices and more affordable works Sabretooth recommends that I try Tezos as a starting point before moving on to Ethereum.

Introduction to NFTs – Q&A – FAQ – Part 1

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 13 Jan 2022 09:00:00 +0800

Part 1/2 - Newbie interview episode with Meta, the podcast assistant, find her on Twitter

Time Stamps

[00:32 – 4:38] Meta asks what websites to use for references, specifically sites like RaritySniper and Rarible. Sabertooth says if you need to use these type of websites, you probably don’t know enough about that project to be investing in it. For kizu, the analysis is useful in an objective comparison. Sabertooth disagrees and says it is actually subjective. He also warns to check out the business model for those sites.

[4:38 – 6:52] Sabertooth says that he doesn’t personally use any websites for educational purposes and recommends that you simply listen to Floor is Rising for the info you need regarding trends, projects, etc.

Continuing, he does says that a helpful way to get more information is by looking at wallets. Using the example of CryptoPunks he says, check out what wallets have Punks then see what other NFTs that wallet owns. By this you will see patterns and transactions.

[6:52 – 11:55] Meta asks about the distinction between the different marketplaces. Sabertooth notes that it is helpful to break them down in to categories of primary and secondary sale. Primary examples would be; SuperRare, NiftyGateway, Foundation, async.art, NewWorld, etc. In these cases the artist is minting a particular work and you buy directly from him via listing or auction. Secondary sale sites include; OpenSea,Rarible, Zora, and you would buy from collectors.

These previously mentioned pertain to Ethereum. Hic et Nunc is different, it is on Tezos. Every blockchain (Solana, Terra, Dfinity) has an NFT ecosystem and thus its own marketplace. Most NFTs are on Ethereum but Tezos and Solana would be the next up.

Kizu recommends, especially for those from the traditional art world, to check out some of the NFT gallery spaces for a more curated experience. One he likes, that was even mentioned by Kenny Schachter, is FeralFile. Kizu says that on there you can even find OG artist like Tyler Hobbs, Refik Anadol, Mario Klingemann (who we just interviewed)

[11:55 – 13:45] Meta asks about minting, sales, and rights. Sabertooth clarifies that an NFT is not tied to a marketplace. This being said, the price can vary on different sites.

[13:45 – 16:36] Moving to wallets, Sabertooth talks about how the terminology and metaphors we use directly affects our behavior. Wallet conjures up the idea that the NFT is stored there, it’s better to think about the wallet as a way to interact. The blockchain stores the NFT.

Ultimately, what people need to focus on protecting is their seed phrase not necessarily the wallet.

[16:36 – 20:33] The way you prove you own what you own is through your seed phrase and this is set up usually when you get a wallet. If you loose this seed phrase that’s it. If you leaked your seed phrase there’s no getting it back, you can’t call up and reset the password.

One thing you can do to protect your seed phrase is to get a hardware wallet. This has a benefit as opposed to a hot wallet (such as MetaMask) because the information is generated on your computer and harder to crack. Examples of hardware wallets would be Ledger & Trezor.

The question then moves to, how to store your seed phrase. The first level is a password manager. Once you have more capital, then you move to breaking up your seed phrase into different parts.

[20:33 – 21:56] Meta asks, are two wallets (hard and hot) needed? Sabertooth notes that they usually integrate but the reason why people still use a hot wallet is because a hardware wallet is less convenient, a hot wallet is quicker. Then for more expensive pieces can be transferred over.

[21:56 – 24:27] Meta asks about Binance Smart Chain and finds out it is an EVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine). Similar to producing PCs that were compatible with IBM but could be made cheaper, we have EVMs so as to produce more affordable options. Binanace Smart Chain is just the most popular one out.

[24:57 – 25:23] Sabertooth clarifies that there is no risk to your wallet being hacked when syncing to different websites. There may be privacy risks associated with linking your wallet but there are no cryptographic risks.

[25:23 – 29:22] Moving to the topic of web 3.0 Kizu mentions that the big companies struck a Faustian bargain harvesting your data and 3.0 is about overturning that trend. In the case of NFTs, the idea is that direct buying happens between creators and collectors.

Sabertooth finds that web 3.0 and DAOs are the biggest terms getting thrown around right now. DAOs are simply co-ops and there are the obvious problems of bureaucracy. Sabertooth thinks they’re kind of overrated.

[29:22 – 32:05] Breaking down smart contracts Sabertooth says that, they are a autonomous running software on a blockchain. It is autonomous because it is running on the blockchain and unlike software on an AWS server, it can’t be shut down.

An NFT is a smart contract, namely ERC 21 (if dealing with Ethereum). You can also find ERC 1155 which is newer but still less popular.

Artist – 10/x – Jon Burgerman – Talent scouted by Nifty Gateway

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 31 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Jon Burgerman

Time Stamps

[1:01 – 3:41] Jon was introduced to NFTs in 2019-2020 when he was approached by Nifty Gateway (founded by Griffin Cock Foster and Duncan Cock Foster and later acquired by Gemini run by Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss) to drop NFTs on the then new platform. He began working on NFTs in the spring of 2020. The first drop sold out quickly. Jon credits this with giving him a lifeline in the pandemic when everything else was being cancelled and closing down.

[4:40 – 6:34] Jon doesn’t know why Nifty Gateway contacted him early on, but says they saw his work in other forms, and imagined it would work on their platform. Jon has a traditional background, but his work has existed across different mediums over the years, including digital stickers and wearables for @PlayStation Home.

[7:35 – 10:26] Jon says his career is like a pizza with each slice it’s own medium (painting, books, etc) but as a whole it’s complete. His advice is to make your work and put it out there. Once you make something, people see your concept and how your work would look. People are looking for good work and good artists - it’s important to make your work discoverable.

[10:45 – 12:36] When working in different mediums, Jon leans into what that medium can do that others can’t. With NFTs he likes that you can interact with people, build up collections and have drops. The goal of the work is the same, just different outlets for creativity that are distributed in different mediums.

[13:45 – 15:12] Jon is still adapting to the community aspect of NFTs. It’s a time investment to keep up with the social aspect of the NFT community using channels like Twitter and Discord. This is a different skill set and a different kind of art will emerge from it.

[15:28 – 16:17] Collectors of Jon’s NFTs are different from collectors of physical works. In 2020 early adopters were buying NFTs, but there is still skepticism and a long way to go for mainstream acceptance. Many of Jon’s physical collectors aren’t interested in NFTs.

[16:49 – 19:49] Jon discusses the blurred lines between collectors and artists with the engagement thru social media, discord, etc. When artists engage with the collectors it takes away the art being fully in control and the fans start to shape the work. He compares this to @Marvel or @starwars films where the feedback loop from fans alters the next installment which pleases the most vocal fans, but not the entire fan base.

[20:26 – 23:07] Jon hopes galleries and traditional spaces will learn from the NFT space and update how they are run. These institutions won’t disappear. If you have a good dealer or gallery, everyone benefits while helping push the art in the direction that they all want it to go in. Collaboration is necessary in some form to get your art out there.

[23:24 – 26:12] Jon discusses his creative process. He needs emotional connection or interest in the work to make it interesting for him. He discusses creating and how many things don’t work, but others hit a point where some things work and you start to see ways to improve the work and more inspiration comes. In creation there’s a mix of inspiration and sadness/dejection, but you need to keep going.

[26:13 – 29:05] Jon touches on artists working with interns or apprentices. Jon says this can work for the Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons of the world who have a team of people around to help fabricate work from your ideas. Jon prefers to work alone and doesn’t have the personality to have a big operation like some big artists.

[29:24 – 32:59] Jon is excited about new opportunities with digital art and has collaborated with his musician brother, Alex Burgerman. He talks about working in the early 2000s using ActionScript in Flash. He’s into trying any medium that will allow him to be creative.

[33:31 – 35:28] Sabretooth and Jon mention Jon’s presence in Asia with a large number of installations and exhibitions. Jon doesn’t know why his work is received so well in Asia, but acknowledges this and recognizes the enthusiasm for his art in Asia.

[35:58 – 38:19] Jon says it’s important for artists to not follow trends. It may bring success in the short term, but doesn’t work long term. Make your own work and maybe you get lucky people will be interested. If not, you are still being yourself.

[38:25 – 40:06] Jon’s favorite artist is Jean-Michel Basquiat. Jon talks about how alive and authentic Basquiat’s work feels and the impact of seeing it for the first time.

Artist – 9/x – RubenFro – VFX master

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 24 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

RubenFro

Time Stamps

[0:58 – 1:23] Ruben’s first experience with NFTs was March 2021. He was working on the @pussyrrriot music video Panic Attack and they released an NFT collectible of the music video divided into four parts.

[1:32 – 1:48] Ruben is Italian and moved to Tokyo 15 years ago to work in software development and was doing that until 2 years ago.

[1:53 – 3:10] Ruben has always been fascinated by interactive installations. Two years ago he went to France to do an installation. Inspiration came from Rhizomatiks and @daitomanabe. Installations work was small but grew. Stopped when the pandemic hit. A year ago started doing more video art, but plans to go back to interactive art.

[3:14 – 5:47] Ruben discusses his process. He uses @unity for 3d art and started looking into point cloud. He got into using Unity more and going deeper and built his framework with shaders he built in Unity. He uses photogrammetry mixed with 360 photography to capture large areas. This allowed him to move into large areas to record the streets of large cities. He built tools to process footage using his framework and shaders to create the interactive installation.

[6:07 – 8:25] In January 2020 Ruben worked on a project in Vietnam that fascinated him and realized he enjoyed this more than creating apps. He decided to focus on video art and music videos. He then worked with Acronym and @ASUS_ROGNA for short films. He started his visual effects company. He is happy choosing his projects to connect with artists such as Pussy Riot and @DEATHPACT

[8:45 – 10:08] His most recent footage is from Vietnam. He’s more attracted to his footage from Vietnam than his scans from Tokyo. Ruben hasn’t had requests for his videos to be stereotypical Japanese. He’s had freedom to explore and use scans from everywhere.

[10:44 – 11:50] Ruben is one of the earliest and most successful artists on @hicetnunc2000. He was introduced by @JoanieLemercier because they were both into the ecological aspect of NFTs and @ethereum. He now realizes it's not exactly as black and white. He started because of that and stayed on the platform because of the community.

[11:57 – 15:40] At the time, Ruben found the Ethereum platform to be too much about how much you’re selling pieces. It was great to see artists with successful sales, but he also felt it was more about that than the art itself. On hic et nunc it was more about enjoying and sharing the work with each other.

Ruben now feels it’s different and is seeing more diverse art with artists with different backgrounds dropping pieces. One thing he enjoyed about hic et nunc is it was popular in developing countries like Brazil and the model with @tezos with low gas fees and pieces that were affordable for a lot of people was revolutionary in a way and that was empowering for artists. On Ethereum you needed more money for pieces. He is staying on Tezos platforms for his drops but is exploring Ethereum platform as well. Ruben did drops on @withFND and @SuperRare with more planned. Only problem he sees with Foundation and SuperRare are the file size limits.

[16:16 – 20:11] Ruben responds to Kizu asking if motion capture artists face a bias due to the larger file size. He says it is challenging, but we are at the beginning of this NFT world and it's still early to say. Ruben says the space has to evolve and improve technologically so there is a larger file size. There are trends as well. Right now, it's all about generative art. He feels the more the space grows, the more pieces we are going to have and the larger the art will be. He loves working on music videos, but is limited in what he can do. He did a video for an event in New York City last month, and it was 12 minutes. He minted it in 5 chapters and it on @opensea, but would have preferred to mint the entire video. He says right now some projects get more attention than others, but thinks we will reach the point where NFT art can have different things and artists and collectors will be focused on different things.

[20:55 – 24:38] Ruben's art is more than the tools he’s developed and point clouds. It’s about how you move the camera and points on the screen so it feels natural. Ruben composes music for the sound pieces. He’s not interested in using his framework to create thousands of pieces. He enjoys making art, learning, and creating tools. It’s about finding your voice. In the NFT space with trends coming and going he feels good seeing young people learning 3d and creative coding, but he worries people are chasing trends, and missing the theme of working on themselves and finding what’s unique about their work.

[24:48 – 25:29] Ruben’s favorite artist is @Reuben_Wu. He is inspired by how he works and the passion put into this work.

A.I. - 1/x - Does Botto dream of electric sheep?

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 21 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with some of the Botto team (choobie, Mario Klingemann, Simon Hudson) find their Twitter or more info on their website

Time Stamps

[0:55 – 3:16] Mario is the artist behind and the project and he has been doing generative, algorithmic and AI art for about 20 years. He says that at some point when dealing with these mediums you start to wonder, can I pass this last step of choosing and learning to a machine?

With blockchain taking off in 2018, Mario felt that this could be the time for this project, but he couldn’t do it alone. So he built a team to help him with the other side of things.

[3:16 – 6:37] Kizu asks about decentralized art and other movements where artists were so engaged with the community. Mario laughingly states that he would never use the term decentralized art and that for him the most question for him is, if a machine can reach true autonomy. He feels that, if possible, decentralized systems and DAOs are the tools that would allow the machine to do .

Right now they are still working to get to a level where the machine could be so autonomous that it could make its own decisions, even fire/hire people. For now, Botto is still in a toddler phase, the AI needs help making decisions, and that’s why the community of stakeholders is so important.

[6:37 – 10:04] Simon started as a member of the community then decided to get more involved. Simon elaborates on the idea of decentralized governance and DAOs - the emerging subtleties of structures and principles that are needed to uphold them.

Simon was working in AI for the past five years and became fascinated with Mario’s work back in 2016. He was drawn to the idea of open, community oriented sourcing as a way to train AI as a reflection of taste. And within that, crypto as a great tool for getting the value to loop back to that same community.

[10:04 – 13:30] Sabretooth notes that Botto is using GPT3 neural network which is widely used in other NFT projects such as Pak’s LostPoets, he asks about the feedback loop and how the experiment evolves to be more autonomous over time.

Mario comments that Botto uses GPT3 for the description generation and that for the image Botto uses VQGAN + CLIP. Botto is a prompt miner, each image is generated from prompts. Botto finds good prompts which then produce interesting forms (aesthetic or mental).

Botto is constantly producing new fragments, about 3-4k every week, it then selects about 350 out of that week which get added to the voting pool. Botto pre-curates what the community sees and that process is influence from previous voting. This trains the model to mimic the voting behavior.

[13:30 – 17:34] The other way that the feedback comes in is that when particular images or topics receive more popular results, Botto will examine those areas for new ideas rather than generating new prompts. Botto is also built to try to surprise people and not be boring. People tend to like things that resemble traditional art but yet later, other people respond that they miss the crazy stuff. Botto tries to combine all of this and the team is currently analyzing how to deal with such mixed tastes.

[17:34 – 19:17] Sabertooth asks if Mario feels that the art is diverging from his own personal taste. Mario says, absolutely! Mario prefers the more grotesque stuff where the traditional, oil paint images are what have recently been winning.

Mario tried to create the algorithm as open and neutral as possible so as to not favor his personal taste.

[19:17 – 23:04] Originally Mario thought to have multiple bots so that each could cater to particular tastes and says that maybe they will get to that but that he already feels constrained by things they have promised such as only creating 52 NFTs per year. Mario finds that that is the difficulty of working in a communal project such as Botto. He thinks that having multiple bots may be a way of handling these issues.

[23:04 – 25:41] There was a fringe case with the work, Blossoming Cadaver, which was influenced by one voter dumping all their votes into one piece. choobie notes that they made a couple of changes to Botto after this so as to make it more egalitarian.

choobie returns to the idea of governance within decentralization; how to manage it collectively and the delicate nature of the balance.

[25:41 – 28:32] Simon comments on his thoughts towards the voting mechanisms and what is fair vs. what happens when you open it up too much (i.e., at what point are you just getting the color brown?). Simon is really curious concerning the nuances of democracy and voting behavior. Shout out to social scientist!

[28:32 – 31:26] Sabertooth brings up the initial token distribution where they did an airdrop for a ton of blue chip projects (Punks, BAYC, ArtBlocks, HashMasks, etc.), and asks what the current token holder distribution looks like.

Choobie says that about 5% of circulating supply is staked in the governance contract but he doesn’t know exactly how many are staking and voting. They are researching and plan to open an API so that all this data can be openly referenced. At one point there were 3000+ people voting, last week it was about 1000.

[31:26 – 32:19] Sabertooth is curious about the loyalty of the stake holders from the different projects that received the airdrop. The guys aren’t sure but state that part of the rationale with the airdrop to blue chip projects was that those are investors who are not in need of selling.

[32:19 – 33:38] When asked their favorite artists; Mario says Max Ernst, choobie - Yayoi Kusama, for Simon, he says his favorite is Botto and that he is super pleased to be part of the project.

Artist - 8/x - Dalek - Return of the Space Monkey

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 16 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Dalek’s website

Social Media
Twitter - @DALEKSPACEMONKY
Instagram - dalek2020
Art listed on
OpenSea
Hic Et Nunc

Time Stamps

[0:55 – 2:41] Dalek was introduced to NFTs by his friend, @lurklovesyou, who told him about @hicetnunc2000 on @tezos. Lurk told him that it was easy, no gas, cheap to mint, and easy to put work out. Lurk set up a clubhouse Dalek joined with @mumbot and @_sampierson and other artists. Dalek liked the community aspect.

[3:01 – 9:29] Dalek got into anime and comic book culture going to high school in Japan. He was into punk rock and early hip hop such as RunDMC, @KurtisBlow1, @DJFlash4eva, SugarHill Gang. He moved to Chicago and got into graffiti in the early 90s. TD who ran Undercover Magazine and Kaws were big influences on Dalek. He moved to California and met and was mentored by Chris Cycle and Mike Giant, Greg Carroll. This was the era of Twist, Amaze, REVOK, @Saber. Kris Markovich convinced him to move to San Diego where he met @OBEYGIANT, the founder of Obey, who introduced him to printmaking and stickers, and taught him to use Illustrator. Dalek did group shows with @new_image_art curated by Rich Jacobs and included Mark Gonzales, @TempletonEd, Chris Johansen, and Barry McGee. He says he still didn’t know how to be a professional artist. He moved to New York to take a step toward becoming a professional studio artist. When he saw @takashipom’s paintings the first time, he knew that’s what he wanted to do. He reached out to Murakami and started working for him.

[11:45 – 13:54] Dalek says artists were interested in certain aspects of Japanese pop culture. Some artists like KAWS, Stash and Futura would go to Japan, but Dalek was more focused on being in New York and learning. He was spending time with Brian McGinnis, and @steveESPOpowers, and anyone he could. His experience with Marakami wasn’t so much about what he was painting, he was way more interested in the technical aspects.

[14:19 – 18:58] Dalek discusses his relationship with his Space Monkey and how it went from being fun to getting repetitive and hitting a wall. He started deconstructing it, and went down a path of geometric explorations. This opened him to learning new skills. After a 10 year break, he started again with Space Monkey in 2017. He says at first it was flat, but Andrew Hosner with @ThinkspaceArt wanted to do a show. Soon after the show something clicked. He has transitioned back into Space Monkey and feels he finally found the formula that made it interesting. He acknowledges it’s what people know him for.

[19:29 - 22:13] Dalek says Space Monkey and Murakami’s DOB are independent of each other. He says a commonality is the riff on Mickey Mouse. He mentions other artists who have riffed on Mickey Mouse such as Slick, @ronenglishart, @Mattgondek, Warhol, Basquiat. Dalek has had some people say Space Monkey reminds them of @TheSimpsons’ Itchy and Scratchy, which Dalek points out is also a riff off classic cartoons. He talks about Murakami’s Boston Museum show and the explosive color clouds in paintings and how it reminds him of an anime riff on classic Japanese painting styles.

[22:14 - 27:46] Dalek responds to Kizu’s question on how the NFT community is a non-stop global conversation and it’s hard to keep up. Dalek says @discord’s accessibility and threads are built so people can easily be caught up. He discusses the community aspect and how everyone contributes and furthers the space. It’s about creating a safe place where people can go to share projects and things they are excited about. Discord provides connection. There is engagement and more personal relationships than on Twitter and Instagram. Dalek runs his own Discord, is a community manager for a discord called Chains, and is being set up as a mod for @ValiantComics discord.

[28:09 - 33:09] Dalek says traditional art collectors may take time to transition to NFTs. He talks about the gamification and tokenization of art. Some people in the Philippines make more money playing Axey games than they could in a traditional job. It’s life changing in that people can earn passive income with it. Some of Dalek’s followers who have bought prints don’t understand the technology but he tries to educate them because it’s not going anywhere. He hints at the growth in the community as @coinbase and @cryptocom build their own systems, they already have a flood of people who aren’t into NFTs yet, and points out how many people are even in the crypto space. He says soon you won’t need crypto to buy NFTs because it will be more mainstream.

[33:10 - 38:40] Kizo discusses how @cryptopunks went from being given away for free to a huge community and views this as opposing the stance of OG graffiti artists. Dalek says most countercultures are about having a voice, creating your own culture when mainstream culture doesn’t provide what you want. Dalek points out every street artist he knows is on Instagram. Social media and NFTs have provided the opportunity for artists to interact with people how they want, to control their own message, and put themselves out there. There are artists from other countries on @opensea who otherwise wouldn’t have had an opportunity. Dalek believes the greatest aspect of NFT's is they allow more people to express themselves and to directly benefit from it.

[38:48 - 39:36]

Dalek says if there was one artist he couldn’t live without, it is Jack Kirby. He says Jack Kirby will forever be the true king. He’s not a fine artist, but you just can't match the quality and the level of work and the cultural impact of his creations.

Trad art crossover - 2/x - Christian Andersen - Michael Jeppesen - Trad Art Gallerists turned NFT marketplace

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 07 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Christian’s Social Media
Facebook
Instagram
Michael website
Social Media
Instagram
LinkedIn
Twitter
June Art Fair website
Social Media
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter

[1:11 - 4:01] Christian was introduced to NFTs when Michael approached him with the idea of bringing NFTs to the JuneArt Fair. With the emergence of NBA Top Shot and Beeple he saw a need for something for the established art world. Michael said you could have NFTs created by artists of the caliber of Jeff Koons and NFTs collectors wouldn’t know who it was. Michael wanted a place more in line with the old fashioned art world where art is curated and JuneArt came from this.

[4:27 - 6:52] Michael says there is a difference between the traditional artists and crypto artists. Generative art projects may look interesting, but mostly sell because people want to make money. Bored Apes and Crypto Punks are interesting from a cultural perspective, but not as art works. Vice Magazine has linked NFTs to a generation. Michael credits the internet with the ability for anyone to use OpenSea and other platforms to publish.

[7:34 - 8:45] Michael says you can look at NFTs or a medium or a scene. The scene is 99% generative art. Michael and Christian look at NFTs as a medium. They work with renowned galleries for JuneArt that have artists working to make new and interesting art. NFTs are an opportunity to take art further.

[9:18 - 12:07] Michael discusses how the traditional art world is internal with small groups vs the large groups of the crypto community. The benefit of the large crypto communities is it’s more accessible and provides the ability to create awareness for art. That creates the possibility to build your own large audience which hasn’t been possible for many in the old fashioned art world. With more accessibility this may lead to more advanced art.

[12:08 - 13:21] Christian talks about galleries opening online viewing rooms(OVRs) to sell physical art digitally. Physical art doesn’t work on a digital platform unless it’s flat (unlike a sculpture). He liked the idea of NFTs alongside a traditional gallery because you see exactly what you are getting.

[13:22 - 17:57] Sabretooth poses the idea that art coming out of PFPs and generative art can be compared to the film industry transition from theatre to film and good art will survive and generic art won’t last. Michael says this comparison isn’t accurate because the art world is already so diverse. Christian agrees with the Sabretooth and says what we see now is scratching the surface of what may come. Michael agrees this could lead to more.

[20:50 - 23:39] Michael says describing Crypto Punks to the traditional art world would make people think of Andy Warhol. He says in the old art world people want to be first. He believes people at art fairs are now trying to pretend they were first to NFTs. For the chess world, Michael created Chess Champs with Magnus Carlson of Play Magnus. The old art world has huge potential. Christian thinks in the next few years more galleries and art fairs will have NFT platforms.

[24:27 - 26:21] Christian says the crypto art world needs artists from the traditional art world such as Simon Denny to contribute to move it forward. Michael gives an example from the JuneArt where there was an NFT from Januário Jano who created a NFT to preserve 200 year old sound of birds from his village in Africa.

Kizu asks about high profile drops from Damien Hirst, Tom Sachs, Rocket Factory, Cai Guo Qiang, Takashi Murakami with Clonex.

[26:22 - 28:58]: Michael is excited for Damien Hirst’s project because he’s been making generative art for years. Christian and Michael mention projects from Jeff Koons, Urs Fischer, and Tom Sachs. Michael says Cory Arcangel does good work and will do work with NFTs soon. Christian uses Simon Denny as an example of a renowned artist making NFTs.

[29:04 - 29:53] Michael’s favorite artist is Chris Burden. Christian’s favorite artist is Marcel Duchamp.

Artist - 7/x - Olive Allen - Drop OG

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 03 Dec 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Website: https://oliveallen.com/

Linktr.ee https://linktr.ee/oliveallen

Time Stamps

[1:02 – 2:32] Olive got into NFTs in 2017 after learning about Crypto Kitties. She delved deeper when she travelled to Asia and heard about ERC 721s. Olive played the game Fortnight in those days and had the idea that it would be great if she could trade skins she held in the game and give those virtual items a status. This gave her the idea for her startup company, Decadent.

[2:49 – 5:04] Decadent was an early version of marketplaces that exist today. The idea was a marketplace to exchange virtual objects such as game items, art, music, film aviators, and more. Olive moved to Silicon Valley and met with VCs to raise money and faced resistance to investing in crypto. She thinks she had bad timing. She decided to focus more on being a creator vs a company founder which tied her up with administrative tasks with less time for being creative. She moved back to New York in 2019.

[5:19 – 6:48] Olive’s career took off when she was 17 living in New York and creating as a traditional painter. At that time she was in a group show that was critically acclaimed. She wanted to be more innovative and create something remarkable. She always felt tech was the future. 13 Dreadful and Disappointing Items was the first drop in the history of the NFT space. This drop got the attention of Duncan Cock Foster and Griffin Cock Foster at Nifty Gateway.

[7:27 – 9:31] Olive thinks the NFT world is about assets and the traditional/fine art world is a tiny facet of that. She says artists have explored technology, but crypto art is more of a movement. She believes the world needs a critic or curator to define this for the bigger art world to better understand it. For now people are acquiring and selling to prepare for the bear market.

[9:32– 11:13] Olive was at Art Basel and showed with Nagel Draxler. They’ve been doing traditional art for 30 years or more. As a well respected gallery in Germany, Olive says Nagel Draxler took a chance on NFTs and younger artists in the crypto space, while other galleries take a cautious wait and see approach. Olive compares NFTs to post-internet where traditional collectors don’t want to miss out. Galleries can be progressive, but the traditional world can be a bit slow in general.

[11:37 - 14:33] Olives talks about a piece she had at Art Basel, Post Death and the Null Address. The piece came from the concept of what happens with digital assets when we die. She says these are immortal and provide artists ultimate immorality.. Olive says at a burn address, NFTs still sit at the null address indefinitely and the image can still be found if you dig for them. She said it’s essentially collecting digital dust in the ultimate place of abandonment, but always there.

[14:34 - 18:20] Olive discusses artists who created NFTs early on versus those who held out. Artists creating more traditional art and thriving don’t need to jump in and create NFTs; Artists can be successful being themselves and not following the hype. Many OG crypto artists were Tumblr artists and others missed the train while some fizzled out. Some artists don’t want to miss out on the NFTs like missing out on Tumblr. Olive references artists Sarah Zucker and Matt Kane as being early to recognize that online communities can be a launchpad for careers. Olive poses the question as to how collectors and art historians assign value to artists asking, is it better to be consistently creating over a long-span, or be early and then disappear? She thinks there’s a combination of the two.

[19:17 - 22:06] Olive and Sabretooth discuss how there are different narratives as to how art being created today is classified: digital, crypto, NFT. Sabretooth believes the term “NFT art” came about from art blocks and generative art. The terms get messy when distinguishing when artists started in NFTs. Olive believes NFT art is an umbrella term for NFTs. Olive mentions her issues with generative art in that it rejects her theory that all art is about meaning.

[23:24 - 26:17] Olive elaborates on her view on generative art. She says art is intentional and has thought behind it. She mentions Duchamp and the thought and intention behind his conceptual art. For Olive, art is imperfect because it’s human with soul. The automation of generative art feels gimmicky and takes away artists’ narrative and expression. Olive thinks we don’t need to rush generative art.

[27:38 - 33:42] Olive, Sabretooth, and Kizu discuss Sabretooth’s perspective comparing the start of art with cavemen drawing on walls to coders creating generative art in that they are both basic and may not age well, but from this a more complex art will emerge. Olive questions the meaning behind generative art. The three discuss the motivation of a paycheck for some artists throughout time.

[33:24 - 35:29] Olive shares a story about introducing Kenny Schachter to NFTs and how he has helped grow the space. She credits Kenny Schacter with introducing the art world to NFTs.

[35:58 - 35:29] Olive says her favorite artists include Richard Prince, Tracy Emin, Joyce Pensato, Gerhard Richter, Edvard Munch, Claude Monet for being the first artist to make an abstract painting.

Artists - 6/x - A.L Crego - GIF maxi

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 26 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with A L Crego, find his Twitter and some of his works at MakersPlace

Time Stamps

[1:11 – 4:23] For Crego, NFTs were a natural step and it was as far back as 2014 that he started to use the internet as his canvas. Originally he moved to crypto more for protection than sales. By 2019 he was contacted by MakersPlace to be a new artist on the platform (where he now curates). Connecting more with the NFT scene happened once Crego joined Twitter.

Crego clarifies that his work is actually not generative and that he does it by hand, frame by frame. That people are often confused even as to what a GIF is, despite it existing for 34 years now.

[4:23 – 13:56] Regarding underrated artist, Crego feels that most of the artist who started digital art are underrated. His position comes from noting that many people in the crypto scene only look to those who are on Twitter and ignore those artist like Pi-Slices, Kidmograph, Glitch Black, and Etienne Jacob who were doing digital art long before on places like Tumblr. He finds it painful when people call him and above mentioned artist as emergent.

Crego goes on to talk about his dissonance towards social media and the business of NFTs as a whole.

[13:56 – 17:49] Crego has coined the term GIFtilism as a homage to Impressionist pointillism. Crego explains; what the point was to traditional art is now what the square or pixel is in digital art. He goes on to make a correlation between comics and GIFs; while comics were originally not taken seriously they have evolved into a high form of literature and he feels that GIF art now being sold on the blockchain also has the room to evolve into something of more value.

[17:49 – 21:43] Looking to the importance of a pixel, Kizu brings up Murat Pak’s sale of a single pixel for $5 million. For Crego, he respects Pak’s work (and even did a similar piece) but finds it to be a bit repetitive.

Crego first got into GIF art as he saw that it was a space that could still be improved. That many of the artist in the space moved on to produce video art but that he stayed with GIFs because he found them to be a powerful tool. He sees the repetitive loop of a GIF as the visual equivalent of a Tibetan mantra.

[21:43 – 26:48] Kizu asks about Crego to elaborate on his views regarding the psychology and philosophy behind GIFs. Crego says that GIFs are the most human format. That our memories work as GIFs.

Crego felt limited in photography (mentions Cartier Bresson for his ability to capture motion in a still shot). Says poorly made photo animations are like the autotune of GIFs. For Crego, time is what gives art value, not money.

In a digital world where almost everything is free, what has value is what calls your attention… and GIFs and motion call your attention, especially if done in a hypnotic perfect loop where the eye can not detect point A from point B.

[26:48 - 31:51] Sabretooth asks Crego about his artistic processes. For Crego the tools have been almost the same for 10+ years, that is; Photoshop and After Effects. His creative process though is often based on poetry he has written and the imagery that the words later give him. He gives the example of writing the quote, “In a world that run so fast, to stop is to advance” and the work that that produced of shoes hanging/running on a wire.

For him, this translation of word into a work is art, the other way around is branding. Crego shares a bit of his views towards generative art and says that he thinks of Pollock as the first generative artist.

[31:51 – 36:23] In regards to most underrated artists, Crego feels that Hieronymus Bosch is the most noteable because of his power to subtly introduce powerful metaphors and idioms. Crego also mentions Piero Manzoni for his ability to use art as a critique. In a more contemporary frame, Crego mentions Lucas Aguirre for his technique of taking oil paintings and transferring them into VR and also Dave Strick.

Artists - 5/x - Lawrence Fuller - Poet, Actor

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Laurence Fuller, find his Twitter @LaurenceFuller and check out some of his works on his website

Time Stamps

[0:48 – 2:06] Laurence got into crypto in 2017. In 2020 when blockchain got one of its first big use cases in NFTs, Laurence felt connected enough to start speaking up about his interest in crypto.

[2:06 – 3:10] Kizu congratulates Laurence on his screenplay, Modern Art, which won the “Best Adapted Screenplay” award at the Burbank Film Festival last year. The film was based on his father, Peter Fuller who started, Modern Painters, a magazine that Kizu has previously written for.

[3:10 – 5:12] Laurence talks about his father who was a controversial figure in the art scene of the time due to his outspoken love for beauty during the avant-garde movement which favored more experimentalism.

[5:12 – 6:58] Caught in the Hollywood ecosystem of labor, Laurence felt disconnected from his journey as an artist. Researching his father drew him back to a sense of connection. During this research he also was inspired by the sense of community that used to exist within the art world. This is also why Laurence loves NFTs, because he feels that it embodies these values of community and belonging.

[6:58 – 10:36] Sabretooth notes that Laurence’s works, which combine poetry with neo-classical imagery set in motion, is very different from other NFTs. Laurence says that he was first inspired by his friend Sima Jo and their collaborations.

He then started posting those works on social media but notes there wasn’t really an audience. With the NFT space he feels there is finally a niche for video art.

[10:36 – 13:20] Inquiring about what Laurence thinks his father’s position would be on NFTs, it comes out that Laurence will be playing the role of David Hockney in a HBO series (due to having the best Yorkshire accent). Hockney, who was one of Laurence’s father’s favorite artists, has been really negative in his position on NFTs. Laurence feels that this is likely due to how they are portrayed in mainstream media and says that this how many people are forming their views toward the scene.

[13:20 – 19:25] Discussing the recent shutdown of Hic et Nunc (HEN), Laurence says he was drawn to HEN because it was a way for him to create his own world. He laments its termination but will now mint his works on objkt. Laurence goes on to talk about how objkt.com started as objkt.bid and was used as an auction site for HEN pieces.

Now Objkt are doing their own minting (using Tezos) and have even created a music platform with Quincy Jones. Some of the catalogue will include John Legend, Whitney Houston, Doja Cat, and The Game. One of the most recent releases was backed by rapper Chief Keef.

[19:25 – 20:09] Sabretooth says that he is hopeful regarding the continuation of the HEN community and points out that founders leaving their crypto projects is quite common in the scene ( e.g. bitcoin).

[20:09 – 26:16] Kizu brings up Laurence’s series, Rebellion Rising, (created in part to mark Caravaggio’s 450^th birthday) and asks about the process.

Laurence gives a riveting summary of the rebellious life of Caravaggio and goes on to talk about how he painted himself as a witness; being part of a scene but also viewing it from the outside. How this is often captured by artist and is also the theme of the poem in this particular work. Laurence elaborates on his thoughts regarding inspiration, performance and originality.

[26:16 - 27:19] Lucian Freud has been Laurence’s favorite artist since he was 14 years old but picking a living artist, his favorite is Henrik Uldalen.

RTFKT x Takashi Murakami - Chris Le - Clonex

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 19 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Chris Le, find his Twitter @clegfx and check out his new avatar project dropping soon CloneX

Time Stamps

[0:33 – 1:11] Chris is the co-founder of Studio RTFKT and soon dropping CloneX, a collaboration with Takashi Murakami.

[1:16 – 8:40] Chris has worked in all forms of entertainment some of the artists e has worked with include; Anderson Paak, NAS, and Rick Ross. From music industry to film he has done it all but always with an emphasis in visual effects (CGI or VFX background) then moved into game skins. Chris developed a lot of skins for the Steam Workshop Platform. In his view skins are the same concept as NFTs.

He then had the idea to put these skins on sneakers and was introduced to Benito through his friend Brock Hofer (Hyperbeast). From there they teamed up with Zaptio to create a digital sneaker brand that could be forged for physicals.

They got funded in 2019 by Galaxy Digital then later by GFR Fund and RTFKT launched in 2020. They returned to NFTs in late 2020 with their release of Cyber Sneaker on Superman.

[8:40 – 11:35] For Kizu he sees a lot of overlap between Chris and Murakami’s background. Starting in fashion, then later moving into the hip-hop industry (Murakami’s colaborations: LVMH, Supreme, Off-White, Kanye West, Ben Baller & Drake)

Chris responds that he only works with people he is a fan of and that their backgrounds (Chris, Zapatio, Ben & Murakami) all aligned, almost as if it were meant to happen.

[11:57 – 13:04] The collaboration came about after the guys at RTFKT did an interview with Forbes Japan after which Murakami reached out with a DM of emojis. The rest is history.

[13:04 – 18:09] Kizu sees Murakami, especially in recent years, as merging the two worlds between hypebeast and nerd culture. This is interesting as usually they are seen as being on the opposite sides of what is cool or fashionable.

For Chris, who has a love for gaming and otaku but also hip-hop culture, this highlights even more the synergy of why and how this collaboration came together. Chris says that him and Ben came into this because they wanted to make gaming cool.

[18:09 – 22:52] Kizu talks about the cultural shift between the need to look cool on and offline and how these worlds are merging.

For Chris who started as a nerdy PC gamer looking up to hip-hop culture, he says that he always knew that pop culture would eventually go in that direction how Clone X for him is bringing these worlds together.

[22:52 – 27:43] Sabretooth notes that there are many PFP projects out right now in the NFT scene and asks Chris how they they came up with, CloneX.

It all started when Ben and Chris started creating virtual influencers (FN Meka) with this background, plus a need to be able to wear their products in the metaverse, a PFP project only made sense. They also liked the challenge of making anime 3D and actually have it look good.

[27:43 – 31:14] The aesthetics of the CloneX project evolved out of a shared love for anime rather than trying to adhere to the tastes of a specific demographic.

[31:14 – 35:34] Kizu brings up how Murakami is a contemporary artist inspired by anime but not actually considered part of the otaku culture. That there is a database of attributes that are used in the creation of anime which form a somewhat rigid structure and that Murakami falls outside of this.

[35:34 – 40:03] Chris talks about how they examined all the details of anime especially the eyes so that they could keep true to a certain aesthetic value, within this though they also wanted to evolve the image so that it represented a bit of the RTFKT taste as well. He admits that people may complain but that ultimately evolution is important.

[40:03 – 44:08] Between the 20,000 avatars that will be released, Kizu notes that they interconnect and cross reference the breadth of the anime database. And that this new work of Murakami could gain him favor in the otaku culture.

[44:08 – 46:12] Chris mentions that there has been some publicity of the project within Japan which makes him really happy as it carries a certain level of validation.

Within the project there are 400 different traits which is enough for over a billion combinations but they are taking their time and really making sure everything looks good and that it still pays homage to classic anime. Chris hopes that people recognize the time and passion that the team has put into the project.

[46:12 – 47:29] The next plans for RTFKT (besides their own metaverse) are a collaboration with On Cyber so that people can have their avatar live in an RTFKT room. There are other collaborations and projects in the works but they have created their avatars so that everything connects and can be worn or used by your avatar.

[47:29 – 50:31] Thinking of how things look once together is a different way of collecting. Chris hopes that people will adapt and change their avatars to their own liking (so long as people pay respect and don’t release them on their own). He thinks of it similarly to VR Chat where people are always create and evolve the characters.

[50:31 – 52:25] This reminds Kizu of Doujinshi, a Japanese copyleft, where popularity is noted by how much people modify it. Chris says this is similar what happen to their Among Drip meme that was popular with Gen Z and blew up out of their control. That’s what he hopes for CloneX. In order to make basic customization was available they teamed with Das and Tafi.

[52:41 – 55:02] The anime and magna that most influenced Chris would be; Akira, Evangelion, Cowboy Bebop, and Fullmetal Alchemist

NFT Collectors 5/x - Denzuul - Accidental NFT influencer through shitposting

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 16 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Denzuul, find his Twitter @Denzuul

[0:53 – 4:50] Denzuul bought bitcoin as far back as 2011, started to really get into it by 2015. Last year (2020) noticed investment potential of NFTs and from there fell in love with the art side of things.

When Denzuul started off with NFTs he thought projects like Kitties and Punks were dumb. Aesthetically he still doesn’t quite get it but, understanding the technology and community behind these projects his respect and understanding has grown.

[4:50 – 7:00] Kizu also agrees that the meme and PFP projects do not do much for him aesthetically which brings up the question, why are these projects so popular?

Sabretooth points out that crypto is, at its core, antagonistic (towards Wall Street or traditional finance). NFTs inherited this antagonism and thus also look to undermine the traditional art world and its values. That is the point or the greatness of it.

[7:00 – 8:26] Kizu talks about the identifying factors of the G’Evol project, and what elements people might identify with. Denzuul denies involvement in the project and states that he is merely a huge fan. That when he first saw a baby in a ski mask, he felt it was tru;y different from other projects and there was something there he identified with.

[8:59 – 10:53] Sabretooth notes that, people come into the NFT space usually because they are attracted to the money that can be made but that this often evolves into a deeper love for the art. Denzuul finds that what actually moved him to feel more connected to the scene was shit posting. This was what brought him to really love the scene.

[10:53 – 12:45] Denzuul was always a shit poster, even back in the crypto scene. He used to have multiple personas, he now almost exclusively focuses on Denzuul profile.

[12:45 – 14:41] Denzull thinks that if Ethereum doesn’t come out with the 2.0 version in the next year or two, that they will start loosing the NFT market, but not their DeFi market. He thinks that art doesn’t have the same need for security as finance. That it is not worth paying $400 per transaction for the extra security and that HEN will take their place if they don’t fix issues around gas fees.

[14:41 – 16:19] Denzuul says that gas fees were really high in spring/summer of 2021. Felt the need to buy JPEGs but couldn’t afford to on ETH so he started to move to HEN. From there he kept finding great projects and got hooked. Now he owns over 1000 works on HEN.

[16:19 – 18:00] Sabretooth points out that we’re in an NFT bear market. Denzuul feels this will probably last until the end of the year, but says that it’s a good thing since you can’t have a market that is always rising.

As crypto goes up, it is natural trader psychology that people will want to hold on to their crypto as apposed to NFTs. Thinks that it may be a rough 6 months but that looking to the long haul he’s still really bullish on NFTs.

[18:03 – 19:00] Denzuul’s favorie artists on HEN are, TokBlok, he is also partial to Dalek as he has a collection with him. He is a huge fan of kiszkiloszki and also gives a shot out to Von Doyle and Laurence Fuller.

[19:00 – 20:05] 95% of Denzuul’s buying process is based on simply if he likes it or not (especially on HEN). 5% is based on value and how much it costs.

[20:05 – 23:15] Looking to the contrast of celebrities versus art historians or critics, Denzuul feels that celebrities will dictate the value system within NFTs. He says that this is true in and outside of the NFT scene and while somewhat unfortunate he doesn’t feel that this will change.

This being said, celebrities are good at pushing things once they’re discovered but Internet personalities and specialized experts are still needed for finding new trends.

[23:15 – 25:02] While Denzuul has quit his job and focuses more on the Denzuul account, he still doesn’t have a vision for where he hopes to go with it. He feels that when you make a plan it is more likely to fail and that he rather just enjoy it and see where it goes.

[25:28 - 26:26] Denzuul’s favorite artist (if he can’t say KidEight) would be TokBlok, Kiszkiloszki and Lucréce.

Artists - 4/x - Vimal Chandran - Indofuturism pioneer

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 11 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Vimal Chandran, find his Twitter and Instagram

https://vimalchandran.com/

Time Stamps

[0:51 - 2:55] Sabretooth starts by asking Vimal how he started with NFTs. Vimal learned about the large profits artists were making through NFTs in February 2021, specifically the Beeple $69m sale. Since then he has been exploring and learning about NFTs, crypto, and bitcoin.

[2:56 - 5:44] Sabretooth asks Vimal what his move to NFTs means for his art. Vimal started with watercolor illustrations as a kid and moved to digital art in 2012. He started with a Wacom tablet and drawing in Photoshop. When holding an exhibition, people preferred physical work though. He was split between his traditional artwork for a profit and digital for personal use. It was revolutionary for him to discover NFTs. This allowed him to make a career out of digital art and not just client work.

[5:45 - 9:21] Vimal has much of his work within the Indian market. Sabretooth is inquiring if his work will go beyond Vimal’s traditional client base. Vimal focuses on storytelling that comes from the area where he lives. For his NFTs, he focused on global and futuristic. He sees his pieces as reaching a global audience. While everyone may not understand the traditional intricacies of Indian culture, the Scifi movement and his execution reaches far beyond.

[9:58 - 13:54 ] Vimal’s series that he is dropping on WazirX and Foundation is a narrative about the issues happening around him. Vimal grew up in Kerala, a region of India with many folk stories. It also has an inclination towards art. Growing up he would read a Sci Fi comic distributed by the Soviet embassy and moved to Bangalore in 2005. Vimal then started to explore these two very different environments. He calls it Indo Futurism. It is a genre that even Bollywood hasn’t explored.

[13:54 - 16:43 ] Sabretooth asks Vimal to explain how he is balancing his design work, gallery and NFT career, and cultivating his social media. Vimal started in 2005 with Facebook and how he started with brands reaching out to him. He believes that there is a different audience on social media than NFTs. He feels like he is starting from scratch again within the NFT space, but wants to continue to complete more of his own artwork in the future. Vimal has reduced his client base and will continue to focus on NFTs. He wants to be known for mixing indian culture with Sci Fi and connecting to a global audience.

[16:44 - 21:40] Due to India’s policies towards crypto, many Indian’s felt the need to use pseudonyms. Sabretooth believes that there are a lot more Indians in crypto than people realize. Sabretooth asks Vimal about his personal experience of the Indian community who are in NFTs. Vimal agrees that there are a lot of people in India in NFTs and it is becoming more popular. It is especially popular for the younger generations even though everyone is talking about cryptocurrencies. He does not believe the government will ban it because they will not be able to ban it. Vimal thinks that they will be part of the global blockchain movement.

[21:41 - 21:40] While it is a tough question for Vimal to answer, his favorite artist is a South African painter William Kentridge. Vimal sees him as being ahead of his time by making small animations and selling them in traditional galleries. In India, his favorite is a contemporary artist is Sheela Gowda. In the global artists business, he follows David Shrigley and Jasper John work.

Trad Art Crossover 1/x - Kenny Schachter - Unfiltered takes on NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 09 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode Interview with Kenny Schachter, find his twitter @kennyschac, his website

https://www.kennyschachter.art/ and check out Crypto Mutts.

Time Stamps

[0:58 – 3:31] Kenny was introduced to NFTs in September 2020. Made art prior to NFTs but never felt comfortable calling himself an artist. After learning about NFTs, he made some NFTs and realized how revolutionary NFTs would be to the art world. Wrote about NFTs in the journal, The Art Newspaper. He was introduced to Nifty Gateway by Tommy Kimmelman and in December 2020 sold several NFTs on the platform. Has pursued NFTs since then.

[3:47 – 7:46] Kenny explains that art is about communication. NFTs are being communicated in different ways. The CryptoPunks set a precedent and people are poking fun at themselves. Kenny created PFPs called the CryptoMutts as satire. Kennys says right now you can also buy a masterpiece NFT, but people are more focused on using PFPs as a substitute for digital currency (which he says is a no-no). Kenny says art is a slow burning process. The NFT community is full of all different people making relevant and meaningful art.

Sabretooth mentions tension between artists and feelings toward PFP collectibles. He references the value of Crypto Punks for being OG art of NFTs, and compares it to Bitcoin being the oldest crypto. He asks Kenny’s thoughts on the thesis that PFPs won’t hold in that high value as more traditional art people come into NFTs.

[9:26 – 13:55] Kenny thinks there are pockets of overvaluation. His own CryptoMutt collection was to create a community and also gave a reduction to an ArtNet subscription. He didn’t like Crypto Punks at first but has grown to appreciate what they signify. He thinks eventually PFPs will go away because they are now just copying what has been successful and don’t have any meaning. He says the market changes swiftly and references art blocks, and generative NFTs from generative photography and computer art in the 60s and 70s.

Kizo mentions that people in the crypto world might not have art history knowledge, and people in the traditional art world may not be interested in how discord works.

[15:25 – 22:24] Kenny references Beeple who has a sculpture at Christie’s with an NFT element (the piece is Human One) in the language of “boomer art” like Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons. When someone commented on a resemblance to Alberto Giacometti’s walking man sculpture, Beeple was uninterested, and said art history is stupid. Kenny uses this to emphasize there are people on both sides (crypto world and traditional world) that aren’t interested in the other. Many in the crypto world who don’t care to learn about art history or have interest in power brokers in the art world such as Larry Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth, Barbara Gladstone, Acquavella, or Pace. Many people in the traditional art world don't care to learn about NFTs. Kenny talks about contemporary artists who’ve transitioned to NFTs, Tom Sachs who created Rocket Factory and Urs Fischer whose project is Chaos. Kenny talks about the difference in their approaches to the transition.

He says people are scared of change and this is on both sides. Kenny says money will drive change and he predicts all major art galleries will have their own NFT platforms in the next two years.

[22:56 – 28:51] Kenny says the NFT market will eclipse the fine art market in the next two years. For all the NFT artists selling high priced pieces, there are 20 million NFT artists floundering. Just because an artist is selling in the millions now, doesn’t mean they will sustain.

Art galleries have a history of not wanting to give away power to the artists. The fine art world is scared of losing money. Auction houses have been open to NFTs because auction houses exist to make money.

Kizu asks Kenny about the balance of art platforms going forward and if both can coexist.

[31:11 – 36:09] Kenny references the large number of art galleries in the New York area alone. The traditional art world has grown more in the last 25 years than the previous 250 years with a large credit given to social media. He said crypto is now contributing to growth. The best thing about NFTs is the melting away of hierarchy and barrier to entry that exists in the traditional art world. Kenny gets as much satisfaction from his own art as he does helping teach others, encouraging people to contact him with questions on social media. Kenny references artists that are creating crypto art such as Sarah Friend, Rhea Myers, Kevin Abosch, Osinachi. Kenny says nothing will ever replace hustle needed to succeed, but NFT platforms where people can mint their own work is giving more access and opportunity.

[36:15 - 40:30] Kenny talks about one of his favorite artists, Paul Thek and discusses his work, Technological Reliquaries,. He isn’t a fan of Jeff Koons and Damien Hirst saying they just make bubbles for rich people. He says artists like Paul Thek and the late Vito Acconci never settled. Favorite crypto artists include Rhea Myers, Sarah Friend, Kevin Abosch, Osinachi.

Artists - 3/x - Stuz0r - Everydays since 2016

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 05 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Stuart Lippincott, find his twitter and SuperRare.

Time Stamps

[0:53 - 4:39] Sabretooth starts by asking Stuart how he started with NFTs. Stuart started to join the NFT world because of the crazy money currently being made. Stuart’s work is very futuristic with an utopian or dystopian feel and pairs with music bands. Kizu asks if there are any influencers that have remained consistent in his work. Stuart explains that he imagines a universe where all creatures and people all live in the same realm. Music is a large contributing factor to his art.

[4:39 - 8:26] Stuart started out using Maya 3D, the 3Ds Max, and now Cinema 4D. Sabretooth asks if Stuart sees the tools as what he can do with them or seeks out tools to create what he wishes to create. Stuart landed on Cinema 4D because it is fairly fast and an easy user interface. He then started to use Octane Render. Octane Render would take a significant amount of time. When Octane came out for Cinema 4D, he challenged himself to learn all there was about the software. Then in late 2015, he came across Beeple’s Everydays. Beeple uses Cinema 4D with Octane and Stuart really started to learn it then. With plugins and addons, Stuart tries to learn as many tools as he can to get his ideas across.

[8:25 - 11:29 ] Kizu discusses how successful artists have a bigger following and others do not have that recognition. Stuart explains how previous to his first sale, he did not know how cryptocurrency worked. He then sold his first piece and continued to sell really well. Then one day the selling stopped. He took a couple of months break and then posted pieces that were popular on Instagram and Twitter. These did not sell either though. Despite his large Instagram following and his Twitter account, it is not the case. He is still trying to figure out his own place in the NFT world.

[11:29 - 13:29 ] To explain this trend in Stuart’s sales, Sabretooth gives his opinion on NFT’s speculation premium. Sabretooth says that people are buying at a premium and that premium says that the price will go up. When the speculation premium was taken out of the market, sales started to decline and have not recovered at this time. Sabretooth asks Stuart to explain how much of his time is spent on client work versus NFTs.

[11:29 - 16:50 ] From 2016 to this year, Stuart was doing client work and his Everyday Project. In July, he decided that he was done with his Everyday Project. His successes from this past year, allowed him to take the rest of the year off from his art. He has chosen to really focus on learning new tools though. Kizu is wondering if Stuart is learning a specific new effect or just adding to his toolbox? Stuart explains that he has a far goal to create worlds in augmented reality using Unreal. The observer would be able to experience a virtual reality scenario within his art. With there being so many tools available, he is always learning. It can all go into his work and be translated into Unreal.

[16:50 - 22:49 ] Looking ahead to Stuart’s future, Kizu asks what his ideal role would be. Stuart explains that he believes a creative director slash art director would be most fitting. He enjoys directing the vision, but also helping with work. Sabretooth has Stuart explain more on the Everyday Project that was made famous by Beeple and a previous show guest, Josh Pierce also subscribes to the process. For Stuart, it was the benefit of stress relief during his lunch break and gathering skills in Cinema. Being that this was in 2016, artists posting Everydays on Instagram was not as popular. Stuart’s work got blasted out there. People were seeing, sharing, and posting it everyday. Then he started to get client work because he was able to create quality work quickly. The Everyday Project ended up being beneficial in many ways and Sabretooth points out how he does not need to complete this project anymore because of his success. Stuart says that he still does work on them from time to time depending on what is happening in his life.

[22:50 - 23:35] Kizu asks Stuart who his favorite traditional or NFT artist is. Stuart credits Beeple for getting him started in this realm and all his support. Stuart has always enjoyed his work and thinks that he is a great artist.

NFT collectors series 4/x - NorCal Guy - Crypto OG turned NFT genesis Art Collector

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 02 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with NorCalGuy, find his Twitter GuyNorcal and check out his podcast NorCal and Shill

Time Stamps

[1:11 – 2:14] Heard about CryptoKitties back in 2017, thought it was just people paying money for a jpeg. By the end of 2020 he got into TopShot.

[2:20 – 3:57] TopShot appealed to NorCalGuy because it seemed like something normies could get into not just crypto guys. His friends like sports so it was a good place to start. Moved to a love of generative art. Building relationship with artist through purchases brought him to really love 1/1s.

[3:52 – 5:45] PFPs are more of a quick income generator, 1/1s are more long term. Generative art falls between the two. This value pyramid is based on the fact that PFPs are just easier to sell.

People like, Cath Simard for example, who work hard and get into the community, NorCalGuy feels those works will appreciate.

[5:45 – 6:34] This echoes similar comments from traditional art collectors who are trying to cross over. Some of them see an appeal of flippable projects but others really still value the due diligence of traditional relationships.

[6:34 – 7:56] NorCalGuy feels that most PFPs don’t have enough community behind them. Instead, with 1/1s, if it’s the art that you like and you can connect with that artist and what they do, then you can gauge better the outcome. Most of his 1/1s have come with a physical copy. If getting into it now he would buy established PFP projects like a Punk or an Ape as a hedge against the 1/1s.

[7:56 – 9:31] For Kizu this is similar to a traditional gallery space, not wanting to be purely commercial while also wanting to support experimental work. Flippable projects subsidize love for less commercial works. He compares this to how NorCalGuy collects.

[9:31 – 11:48] Sabretooth talks about how the 1/1 format of collecting really started with SuperRare and this is now common, but before that 1/1s were not really native to crypto art. Looking at web 2.0 or even 1.0, the things that tend to succeed are native and not skeumorphic. If this model continued, could it be the case that 1/1s become relics of their time?

[11:55 – 14:00] Primary or secondary collecting doesn’t matter to NorCalGuy. With Brendon North it was initially all secondary but he got it for almost the same price as primary.

He determines whether good price or not by looking at things like; previous sales, social engagement, and non-NFT sales. Ultimately it goes off gut feeling, recommendation, and experience.

[14:00 – 18:03] Sabretooth draws attention to the idea that NFT collectors and crypto investors are basically making relative valuations based on other currencies or works that are successful.

NorCalGuy feels that rather than taking that approach, he really goes off of artist’s work ethic and proof that they’re in it for the long haul. He gives the example of photographer Eric Rubens or Brendan North.

[18:03 – 20:06] Instagram changed the game for a lot of artists; it created a line of direct communication with buyers that fostered a relationship of tailoring work. Previously this was only done through galleries.

NorCalGuy doesn’t want to give artistic direction. He stays with the simple idea that, if I like it, I buy it. He does however thing that artist can use help with pricing.

[20:16 – 21:23] The market was hyperactive back in February/March (2021) and NorCalGuy feels this lead to overpricing, hints the slow down in the following months as collectors waited for the market to readjust. Artists should consider their peers as potential collectors and price accordingly.

[21:29 – 23:10] NorCalGuy hasn’t collected outside of Ethereum. On one side because he’s lazy, on the other because he thinks the issue of gas fees will soon be resolved and there won’t be a need for the other platforms.

This brings up the question, how much of the pricing in Ethereum is simply because of the high gas fees?

[23:10 – 24:56] Comparing this to the traditional art world, Kizu feels it is like collectors buying at Art Basel for a higher price than one would pay at the smaller fairs. Some only want to collect from big fairs because they want someone to do the curation for them; they want the valuation that comes along with the established names.

[25:14 – 26:44] Just because an artist is selling doesn’t mean they are legit. NorCalGuy talks about why it is important to thoroughly research artists.

[26:49 – 27:15] Ansel Adams is NorCalGuy’s favorite artist.

Artists - 2/x - Khaled Makhshoush - Saudi pixel artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 29 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Khaled Makhshoush, find his twitter and SuperRare.

Time Stamps

[0:53 - 3:26] Sabretooth starts by asking Kaled how he started with NFTs. Kaled explains that it was last year when he received a direct message from a collector who introduced him to NFTs and SuperRare. After a month of deliberating, he applied and sold his first piece of art on SuperRare. Sabretooth believes that collectors or fans encouraging an artist to go into NFTs will become increasingly popular. Khaled explains that his biggest concern was selling the copyright to his artwork. Once he understood the technology though, he believed there was no harm in trying.

[3:27 - 7:46] Kizu asks Khaled about his background of playing and developing video games. Khaled answers how in 2016 he created video games at the Ludum Dare Video Jam. Through his frustration of not being able to create the video game the way he envisioned it, he decided to learn pixel art. He does not focus on game development much anymore because he enjoys expressing himself and creating an attachment to the artwork. After Kizu inquires about how Khaled’s work came first and then the NFT medium being secondary, Khaled agrees. He is able to create his artwork from an idea that he is interested in.

[7:47 - 8:25] Pixel art is one of the most popular mediums with CryptoPunk being one of the most well known NFTs. Ethereum is an NFT collection that holds a large number of varying styles of pixel art that were inspired by the early 70s and 80s video games. Sabretooth wonders what pixel art is to Khaled personally.

[8:27 - 11:29 ] Khaled explains how you draw with a grid. Each square of the grid is a color and he creates a mosaic type of artwork. Through technology any drawing software can be used, but each line is very crisp and pixelated. Following tradition that began due to limited technology, pixel art has a very limited color palette and canvas size. Khaled works on a large canvas with few colors. It is these limiting factors that give pixel art a unique look. Sabretooth points out with how Pixel art is one of the dominant forms in NFTs and inquires if pixel artis in NFTs and those who are not are progressing in different directions.

[11:29 - 15:26 ] Khaled agrees that in NFTs there are people who represent various scenes that come from the larger pixel art scene. Creating collectables is currently popular right now, but there is a divide occurring in the pixel art scene unfortunately. Sabretooth clarifies if you can not create art and create art for NFTs. Khaled expands his explanation saying that it wasn’t specifically pixel art, but social media artists. In March people were so hesitant about NFTs being a scam and the environmental concern that they did not complete NFT art. Khaled sold some of his pieces though and knew it was not. Kizu states how people were unfamiliar with the technology and used the environmental concern as a negative to speak up about.

[15:27 - 20:26 ] Khaled finds satisfaction in creating his art. It took time for him to become profitable from his artwork though. He discusses the balance of exploring the art that interests him and making a career out of it. He started with commissions and even though they are stressful for him, it is a grounding challenge. Today with NFTs, he is able to be more selective about the commissions he takes on. His approach is difficult as he balances creating art or creating art to become a NFT. Sabretooth wonders where the dangers of that lie. Khaled says it is not dangerous, but something to think about and balance.

[20:27 - 24:26 ] Sabretooth advances on Khaled’s thoughts on balance, wondering about those artists that create constant art due to the boom happening currently. Sabretooth discovers how Khaled is not thinking that way. Khaled explains that NFTs are elastic and if the artist can create work and amend it, then it works for that artist. Personally, Khaled does not want to create work with the sole purpose being to create a NFT. NFTs allowed him to be more relaxed because it took off the unneeded pressure to find clients.

[24:27 - 31:29] Kizu asks Khaled if there are any preconceptions about Saudi artists. Khaled explains that there are some flourishing scenes happening, but it is in a more traditional sense. Digital art is rising though and within that pixel art. Those who are uneducated about art relate pixel art to Atari. Khaled acknowledges how he has been influenced by a lot of things and creates artwork that is more cosmopolitan that traditional Saudi art. Kizu adds to this how in his experience an artist will try to be a spokesperson for their culture and address preconceptions or they choose to deliberately not address the local culture because their audience is global. Especially in pixel art where it is a worldwide culture and would identify with the art being created. Khaled agrees with Kizu and does not want to call his artwork westernized because it is who he is.

[32:09 - 34:38] Sabretooth asks Khaled who his favorite artists are, NFT or otherwise. Khaled picks those who inspired him to go into pixel art. His favorites consist of Ella from Russia, Jubilee from the United States, and Gutty Kreum. He recommends an account called Pixel Art NFT Week that focuses on Pixel art.

NFT Collectors series - 3/x - Chris Wallace - Tezos to Woodies

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 26 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Chris Wallace, find his Twitter chriswallace and check out his new project Woodies

Time Stamps

[1:02 – 2:27] Chris got into NFTs in March of 2021 when a friend invited him to the Foundation platform with a creator invite. He started posting pieces and people were buying them. From there he got really involved in Tezos with Hic et Nunc (HEN). He now has about 3500 NFTs.

[2:50 – 5:32] As artists were looking for a greener solution to NFTs, Hic et Nunc launched. Chris saw value in this system as it favored proof-of-stake instead of proof-of-work. He also thought it was cool that it went beyond the 10,000 piece generative projects that were popular in April 2021 and that in general it just felt like a more creative and underground spot. Affordability and getting a better ROI were also contributing factors.

[5:46 – 8:22] Where on Ethereum artists may stick to generative or collective approaches that attract more money, with Tezos and HEN, minting is more affordable which is providing artist with an outlet that allows them to put out more interesting and experimental works. Chris gives the example of seeing really interesting GAN works on Tezos.

[8:22 – 9:57] The cost of minting has encouraged artists to have multiple personas or sub-portfolios, almost as if they had split-personalities. In a way this correlates with the traditional art world where, sometimes artists will prefer to work with smaller art fairs as it allows them to create without the heavy pressure of producing something more commercial.

[11:05 - ] Chris’s projects like Ultra DAO and Woodies are on Ethereum because at the time his developers had more experience writing in the Ethereum ecosystem and there were few smart contracts on Tezos.

The creation of Woodies started as a joke when artist Lucréce posted on Twitter he was going to sell planks of wood and use the money to buy a house. The idea advanced, artist from the Ultra DAO group got together, then artist J-838 really perfected the image with his drawings which reflected a more humanoid figure.

[15:13 – 18:50] PFPs officially started with CryptoPunks in 2017 but the modern PFP project really started this year with HashMasks. Chris feels that historical relevance is important but that ultimately, success of PFP projects comes from other factors such as lifestyle and people getting into a community that reflects their personal interests (i.e.; DeadFellaz, 0N1 Force, BoredApes).

[19:32 – 21:09] In questions of longevity in regards to identity based PFPs versus memes, Chris feels that memes also carry a strong sense of community and belonging (such as Pepe the Frog) and that really that’s what people are after and care about the most.

[21:18 – 22:53] Woodies hopes to appeal to nature-lovers as well as families and kids. They hope to eventually branch out to do outdoor events and festivals where people can get together. They also hope to evolve more on the side of building narratives and lore that can be used for education.

[23:27 – 28:02] Ultra DAO started as more of a faction inside of an artist project called Botanica where artist, liquid density, used 3D flowers which started a sort of gamified drop system. Chris is competitive and wanted to collect all the flowers and this is what pushed them to form a DAO. Ultra DAO later focused on historically and culturally relevant NFTs. Their current focus is Woodies and looking to how they can scale-up.

At its core Ultra DAO is really a collection of people who want to do cool things together. It is morphing and does not fit the mold of a traditional DAO.

[28:02 – 32:11] There is a tension that exist as we are wanting to be more decentralized yet we also want to be more community lead, but that also causes problems of confusion and ownership. Leaders or visionaries are needed but it is also important to develop mechanisms of democracy. You don’t want to create a dictatorial relationship. That’s why DAOs are great, you have a lot more opportunity to contribute but with less of the power dynamics that you would find in a traditional corporate setting.

[32:31 – 32:58] For her amazing GAN work, Chris’s favorite artist is Jenni Pasanen

Artists - 1/x - Josh Pierce - What is originality in NFT art?

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Josh Pierce, find his twitter, website, and SuperRare.

[0:51 - 2:46] Josh Pierce has been following Beeple's work since 2012 when he started to post everyday artwork. He has been longtime friends and fans since they work with the same software. In November of last year he was contacted by tommyk_eth from Nifty Gateway to post his own artwork. Josh started in December after other artists dropped art on SuperRare, he posted his piece Genesis.

[2:46 - 3:26] Kizu points out how trash art follows the development of a medium, but finds Josh and similar artists to be independent to historical trends. Kizu wonders if Josh sees a diverse audience and market among the scene for all different types of art.

[3:58 - 6:07 ] Josh explains how it was around ten years ago when social media was expanding quickly, that there was a movement of artists creating everydays. Joey Camacho from Raw and Rendered was a pioneer for this movement. The challenge and different technology then started to sculpt artists into different styles and categories. Josh joined in and has been creating art with his own themes and ideas. He believes that the fact that it’s digital lends itself to blockchain.

[6:08 - 11:30] Sabretooth asks Josh about the evolution of the technology that he uses, especially Cinema 4D. Sabretooth wonders with technology constantly being updated,will today’s art become ordinary in a few years. Josh has been using Cinema 4D since 2001. It wasn’t until the technology upgraded in 2015 with Octane that there was a shift in power. Josh states that this shift was monumental. It was this that allowed him to create art that he always dreamed about. Art that has significance is what people have never seen before. He believes it is that art, that will make history books and gives something significance.

[11:21 - 14:45] Kizu wonders what Josh considers originality in the NFT space or if it is even possible to achieve. While Josh believes it can be unfair for artists to not get the recognition they deserve, true artists know that it is between the artist, audience, and universe. It is ultimately a greater creative force that comes from a process and no one really understands it. He defines originality having to do with the process and how it can only really happen if it comes from the heart.

[15:00 - 17:33 ] Sabretooth asks about Josh’s balance between his NFT and working artist career. Josh is taking this season off from his six year career with the NFL, to continue with his art. He enjoys working with Nifty Gateway and SuperRare. He has a collector’s only drop happening. It will be called Transmutation and it is an evolution from his Portals Collection. Sabretooth asks for clarification of how this came about. Josh wanted to do reward pieces based on the previous drop. The idea was inspired by Bored Ape Yacht Club's MAYC drop. It is the evolution, and struggle of life and turning it into something joyful.

[16:40 - 19:04 ] Kizu asks Josh how important it is for him to know art history or to engage with his contemporaries in the NFT space. Josh explains how in the 20th century art went from purely being beautiful to being about emotions. One of his favorite artists, Francis Bacon, captured emotions in a raw way, influencing later artists like Basquiat and even X Copy. Josh wants to create beautiful landscapes with abstract energy and that is not done right now in the art world.

[19:08 - 23:11 ] Considering Josh is also a collector of NFTs, Sabretooth asks how he views what is currently going on with NFTs. Josh enjoys everything that is happening currently. From the financial and investment side, but also the friends that he has made with like artists. Sabretooth follows with what is next with Transmutations. Josh has been working exclusively on his art since February. His process of doing daily work and posting it to his Instagram has allowed him to continue with collaborations and drops on different platforms. He will have a piece up for NFT NYC.

[23:12 - 25:36 ] Sabretooth asks who is Josh’s favorite artist. Roger Dean had the most influence on Josh. He values Dean’s stance on art and how inspirational he is for himself, but also other artists.

NFT Collectors series - 2/x - Colborn Bell - Museum of Crypto Art

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 14 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode Interview with Colborn, find his twitter colbornbell and check out his Museum of Crypto Art (MOCA)

Time Stamps

[1:01 – 2:10] Colborn’s intro to NFTs was with Moon Cats. When these later had a resurgence in the NFT scene he was able to go back and recover 17 from his original mission.

[2:58 – 4:13] First inspired by the Inhotim Museum in Brazil, when building MOCA Colborn looked to the history of physical museums. From this he adopted the rule to NOT participate in the commercial side of the artwork. Art and artists in the NFT scene often get overlooked and Colborn found it was important to favor them over the market.

https://verticalcrypto.art/a-recap-of-the-interview-with-colborn-bell-from-the-museum-of-crypto-art-and-micol-from-verticalcrypto-art

[4:13 – 5:36] Looking to use crypto currency as a tool for empowerment and a way to flatten identity biases. Just like the visual language of crypto, it is important for Colborn that the NFT scene has its own heroes. Along with this he also feels it is important that the scene is empowering creatives and pushing forth the melding of technology with creativity.

[6:10 – 8:44] Colborn finds that through the curatorial nature of most traditional art spaces there is a certain level of sterility and that this can be combated by providing the audience with the tools to explore for themselves. Similar to Somnium Space, leaving the experience to the viewer’s eye is empowering. With MOCA Colborn looks to bend realities and possibilities in hopes to convey to others what can be possible and to get them thinking.

[10:12 – 12:37] Art should not be put into a narrow category. When it comes to MOCA Colborn plans to include all forms of digital art as they all have their place within the history of NFTs. What worries Colborn is that the trend of profile pics feels a lot like the late stage 2017 ICO boom; people are making a lot of money but at some point the bottom will inevitably fall out.

[13:54 – 15:40] People getting in just to flip doesn’t hold value. Colborn hopes the profile picture phenomenon is waning. He finds other new projects like Art Blocks to be unique and a valuable tool for creators.

[16:36 – 18:38] Created the MOCA token with the hopes to counter the traditional top-down approach in the arts and culture. Traditional sources of power generally push culture down but with crypto we have the opportunity to push people up. In this fight against high culture you have folk heroes of crypto like XCOPY who is working in a hyper contemporary style and whose work provides social critique.

[19:12 – 21:35] Looking towards what happens when people are done collecting, Colborn has projects like the Genesis Collection. Views the MOCA Member’s Pass as a metaverse passport; a way for people to express their identity. Concerned with how to build a living history and interested in helping people curate within their own collection.

[21:49 – 24:42] The metaverse as a global internet community; a social overlay that isn’t constrained by physical reality. Sees MOCA as a space for the public good where people can get together. AI can be a powerful tool for connecting people but we need to look out for profit-driven experiences that we are using for social connections (i.e., Facebook, Instagram).

[24:42 – 27:32] Building a public good in a financial area is an interesting paradox. MOCA does not have a revenue model apart from the token. Colborn hopes that through the vision and the project people will join in and support. Separated from original partner Pablo Rodríguez Fraile.

[27:42 – 30:02] ] Colborn believes in being as public and transparent as possible. Martin Lukas Ostachowski, on the artist council for MOCA, felt the weight of curation and how it plays in history. MOCA looks to separate power outside of just one individual or certain individuals.

In general collectors care more about perverting history than artists. Wants to continue being an artist based museum where artists feel free and comfortable to create.

NFT Collectors series 1/x - Deeze - PTSD from 2018 made him sell too early

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 08 Oct 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Interview with Deeze, find his twitter DeezeFi and his project Fractional

Time Stamps

[1:03 – 2:59] In 2017 Deeze was involved in crypto and had made some money through altcoins but didn’t know what an NFT was. By 2020 gets his own wallet, in September after the uniswap run he bought his first NFT. Recognized the value system at play with Punks and started to go down the rabbit-hole of NFTs.

[3:40 - 6:14] Punks: Deeze used to trade in order to make money and afford the ones he really wanted. Noting how much money he was able to make off flipping Punks made him realize that he should focus on trading NFTs instead of just crypto.

Trading Punks is different now. Before you could sit in larvavalabs discord, watch the bot, and act off gut feeling. Now there are external bots that will always act before you can. In order to make money now you have to think on a longer time frame of holding then selling in a few months or more.

[6:43 – 10:09] Deeze knew he was going to leave his normal job but made the leap once joining the Fractional team.

The main function of fractional.art is turning an ERC 721 or an NFT into ERC 20 tokens which are tradable and usable. Project took off when PleasrDAO managed to get ahold of some of the original doge meme pictures taken by Atsuko Sato. PleasrDAO had the idea of fractionalizing it as a way to give back to the community. Doge meme serves as a good example of how fractionalization can change collecting.

[10:35 - 14:09] Fractional ownership feels better for Deeze. The market can be hard to access; more known projects are too expensive and lesser known ones too unpredictable. Factional NFTs help get people access to blue-chips.

[14:47 – 18:14] There are other fractional projects out there but they each have their own styles and mechanisms. The market will decide what works best. Fractional is working with PartyBid.

Deeze sees that a one-on-one in group ownership is going to be the way it goes instead of edition sizes. Editions are a set price and with partybid you can join with as little as you like. It just makes sense in both position allocation perspective and accessible buy-ins.

[18:14 - 23:13] Coming soon there will be different fractionalization options such as the ability to turn ERC 721s into editions themselves or 1155s that will be tradeable and displayable.

[23:32 – 26:55] The learning process: Deeze didn’t realize how different the NFT market could be from the altcoin market and 2018 served as a lesson in risk management. Shifting from thinking solely in ethereum to considering USD values has also been a learning experience.

[27:16 – 29:11] Deeze feels that the reason behind recent expansion and change in value is the combination between crypto natively rich and traditional art collectors, both going in and throwing down. This has also given rise to the popularity of generative art. Snowfro had a strong role in this realization for Deeze.

[29:28 – 34:35] When Deeze buys one-on-one art it’s more for personal satisfaction and he probably wouldn’t sell it whereas with almost any profile picture project he would.

Sabretooth feels that profile pictures will hold their value and that they have renewed interest in portraiture. One-on-one artists are now adapting and rotating to collectibles.

[34:35 – 39:58] Artists seem inspired by figures such as Justin Aversano who released his collection “Twin Flames” with no inherent rarity or scarcity. Will this give rise to a reduction in the implicit gambling mechanism attached to NFTs?

Sabretooth says that the hot mechanisms of NFT projects will fluctuate but gambling will always be part of the NFT scene and society at large.

[39:58 - 41:32] Deeze’s two top artists are Killer Acid and Pop Wonder. His favorite project is still Punks for everything that it did and still does in the community.

NFTs and the Law - Ryan Su Art Lawyer

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 30 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Ryan Su is a well known international art lawyer based in Singapore - https://twitter.com/TheRyanSu

Special counsel at OC Queen Street

[01:19-03:22]Was a young law student and fell into art law by accident on exchange to Europe. A lot of pro-bono work on behalf of artists.

[03:22-09:45] Beeple’s $69million sale was the moment that Trad art took notice. Decided to write a contract for Artists getting into NFTs, and make if available on the latest issue of Art Asia Pacific, a ton of the traditional art artists that wanted to get into NFTs were very worried about IP issues and how to protect IP if they were to do a NFT. In Trad art world, usually the gallery makes every collector sign a contract, and usually that contract is to protect against flipping. And not the collector side, they want protection against fakes. However these issues are not really present in NFTs.

[09:45-15:46] Sabretooth argues that these concerns that are primary to trad art artists, are not actually that relevant in NFTs because you want a lot of reproduction and derivatives, and that resale royalties are a better way of capturing value than IP enforcements. Ryan explains the history of the artist resale right comes from artists like Robert Rauschenberg that affords artists resale royalties in some countries even if there was no explicit contract stating so.

[15:46-21:15] Discussion occurs on how sales contracts that are signed in meatspace will be enforced in NFTs since buyers and sellers are anonymous. Delve into the history of the how resale rights came about from the Siegelaub contract, which really relies on an honour system and many people just ignore it. Still feels there is a barrier for traditional artists to embrace NFTs because ownership data, legal contracts are in different places. Sabretooth explains that enforcement of resale rights work much better on the blockchain. And that because transactions are so transparent, artists will attempt to use whitelists and blacklists to encourage compliance with people who might want to circumvent the royalty.

[21:15-27:49] Ryan sees a clear segmentation of NFT buyers and Trad art buyers and very little overlap currently. Also sees the possibility of new norms being established int he NFT world that is different than the Art world, especially one to do with copyright and copyleft, where ownership of the original is more important than the IP. Ryan’s favourite artist is Andy Warhol.

Debate - Are NFTs a scam? - Dennis Porter - Bitcoin Maxi

Floor is Rising Podcast — Wed, 22 Sep 2021 20:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Dennis Porter, find his twitter Dennis Porter

Time Stamps

[0:54 - 3:29] Dennis got involved with Bitcoin in 2017 by starting with mining and trading. When the shutdowns occurred in 2020 he decided to join the new Clubhouse App and quickly became addicted to talking about Bitcoin. Soon after he started his podcast called Smart People. Then switched to Twitter full time. Dennis refers to himself as a Bitcoin maximalist and claims that NFT's themselves are not scams. Recently he held a debate with Udi Wertheimer. Udi found one tweet where Dennis accidentally referred to NFT’s as a scam and thought Dennis’ view to be mute moving forward.

[3:29 - 5:26] While what anyone says in one tweet is not really the basis for an argument. Dennis’ argument against the NFT being that you don’t own the copyright to the what NFT is. If you buy an NFT that an artist has released, you're just buying the NFT. The copyright always stays with the artist. He does not agree with the way it is being marketed. Dennis tries to educate the average investor so that they’re aware of what they are purchasing.

[5:28 - 8:27 ] Sabretooth points out that the copyright on an NFT is not any different than other physical objects such as paintings, collectibles, comic books which all hold value without copyright. Dennis finds that the difference between digital art and physical art is that digital art can be copied perfectly by anyone at any time. He also points out that with digital art you can not control the actions of others. There are no rules when it comes to copying or uses. He believes that it is important to ensure that copyright and IP is included when buying these items to be able to ensure control.

[8:28 - 13:16] Sabretooth discusses the framework of ownership being redefined for blockchain, cryptocurrencies, both fungible tokens and non fungible tokens. How ownership as a construct is purely man-made and has no meaning outside of what humans give it. Ownership in a cryptographic sense you have control of the the private key basically, that's what ownership means. He believes a large part of the disagreement is actually the usage of these words. Dennis' difficulties with ownership and NFTs lay where in order to have true ownership it needs to be enforced by the laws.

[13:18 - 19:00] Sabretooth points out that the perfect replication of digital art is an advantage of NFTs over physical art because you can have perfect duplication without affecting the provenance of the original. With the ability to track things using a timestamp is truly a concept that does interest Dennis about NFT's. Just like with his tweet that Udi used against him, he takes back the tweet and apologizes to anybody who thinks that he is lying. His position has evolved dramatically since that tweet went out. He thinks that it has potentially great work to be used as a utility and real world, but when talking about having the NFT, can it be similar to a physical item? Dennis is a firm believer that NFTs can not link to physical items.

[21:23 - 28:36 ] Sabretooth talks about how NFTs are still constantly improving and is a work in progress, especially with respect to how the image is generated and stored. Dennis points out that NFTs still rely on an external party or group which, even with the IPFs, certain artworks have been temporarily missing. Artists like Grimes, Deadmou5, and Steve Aoki work has gone missing. Even though it was restored, the fact that NFTs rely on external parties is a big problem. He does not think that it is totally figured out and people are not being totally educated on the fact that the ownership is not enforced. There is a discussion on onchain generative artworks that do not have any external storage requirements.

$TRSH art series 3/3 - Yuna - Feminist NFT OG

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sat, 18 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0800

CryptYuna twitter https://twitter.com/cryptoyuna

Website: http://cryptoyuna.art/

Avatar project: https://lostavatars.art/

[0.55-03.25] Yuna first got into NFTs when she saw a tweet by OG $TRSH artist Robness on twitter.

[3:46-7:14] She orignially was an oil painter in traditional art and wanted to paint realism, but when she got into NFTs, realised that she had to switch to digital techniques, so started learning how to use Procreate on an iPAD. She became part of a artist community on Telegram that became the $TRSH Art group. She gets bored easily, so resisted having a "signature" style for a while in her career, but eventually she did develop a recognisable signature style.

[7:43-9:28] Yuna doesn't consider her Art "$TRSH art" anymore, sees it as a distinct time period in CryptoArt history. Was a reaction against people disparaging the artists, and sees a lot of the pieces as an inside joke that was remixed and shared amongst artists.

[9:57 - 13:37]Yuna along with Stina Jones, Angie Taylor and Sparrow started WOCA organised the first female NFT art show CryptoVoxels called She ART. This led to an even bigger all female exhibition organised by GraffitiKINGS and Darren Cullen and supported by WOCA that was featured in NBC News called Graffiti Queens that spanned 9 galleries and over 300 works.

[13:47 - 19:11] Yuna's kids kept asking her why she wasn't doing NFT game, and she saw a lot of other profile picture projects where she didn't like the art and wondered why Artsts were not doing these projects. So decided to push the boundaries and do Lost Avatars with GraffitiKings and Arnold Which is set to launch soon.

[19:32- 22:26] Yuna talks about future plans, including buying land in the Metaverse, holding concerts there for her avatars, doing exhibitions in China and Korea.

$TRSH art series 2/3 - Max Osiris - F*CK the DMCA

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 09 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Max Osiris. Find his twitter Max Osiris Art and his blog at Max Osiris.

Time Stamps

[00:37 - 01:30] Max was bitten by the NFT crypto art bug in 2018 when, during his research on blockchain, he stumbled across SuperRare and the concept of art as NFTs on the blockchain.

“It [NFT crypto art] seemed naturally like the evolution of art. I had the intuitive sense that this is going to be big.”

[01:31 - 02:53] Max then started submitting artwork to SuperRare, describing it as a digital and modern fine art gallery.

“They [SuperRare] looked like Sotheby’s.”

[02:54 - 04:19] Describes himself as a transdimensional artist. Has been called a digital shaman, which he understands he might have earned through his interests in psychedelics and visionary states.

[04:20 - 04:59] Some of Max’s favorite art is art that speaks to something (be it political issues or philosophical issues). Feels crypto art is a good vehicle for capturing the zeitgeist.

[05:03 - 07:20] Feels that the democratization of art is one of the most exciting aspects of NFT crypto art. Resents the idea that there is an exclusive group of people like Kenny Schachter who have “great taste in art” and who, thus, dictate what great art is.

[07:25 - 08:50] Loves that crypto art has disintermediated the art world, making traditional art galleries and curators less important than they used to be. Notes that individuals can now show off their NFT crypto art collections (like Robness, X Copy, etc) on sites like Cyber.

[08:51 - 12:14] Has had to mint art on different platforms like KnownOrigin, Rarible, and OpenSea because, at some point, he was kicked off another platform. Was kicked off SuperRare because he used portions of Hackatao in his “I1O I1O I1O [EDIT] LOVE” piece without Hackatao’s permission. Was kicked off KnownOrigin because he got doxxed.

[12:15 - 13:27] When an Institut Gallery show in London demanded that Max’s submission be bound by the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act), Max refused and, instead, submitted a piece titled DMCA which was mostly whitespace with a paragraph talking about the absurdity of the DMCA.

[13:38 - 14:28] Displeased that Kim Dotcom was harassed over copyright issues and has been fighting extradition for about 10 years. Largely blames industries that pay lawmakers to control individual artists through digital rights management and, invariably, stifle creativity.

[14:29 - 16:38] Robness digitized the 64 GALLON TOTER as a protest to copyright issues and Max being banned.

“That was like the resistance piece to me getting banned, amongst other things.”

This was to be the beginning of the Trash Art movement, with more artists joining in to stand up for each other against the gatekeeping on platforms. Following the clamour by artists that the ban on Max and Robness be lifted, the platform eventually caved, agreeing to let Max and Robness back on with hopes that they would not “cause any more trouble”.

[16:39 - 19:28] Max believes the platforms are simply trying to avoid hosting content that violates copyright laws. Resents that DMCA is used to stifle creativity, control, and extort money from artists. Discusses Pepe the Frog creator Matt Furie vs Sad Frogs District, where Matt, via a DMCA takedown request, prevailed on OpenSea to take down the Sad Frogs District project.

Sabretooth reflects that since most NFT projects are run anonymously and one needs to reveal one’s identity when filing a counterclaim to the DMCA, copyright holders could file even baseless copyright claims, knowing that the artists are more likely to decide fighting the DMCA takedown is not worth revealing their personal information.

[19:29 - 20:42] Max’s ex-girlfriend used a celebrity’s photo on her shoe website, and she received an automated DMCA takedown request demanding that she pay a fine and stop using the photo. Max also had a run-in with DMCA, where they took down his tweet of a piece of crypto art because it “contained, within it, an image of a porn star”.

“I hate the automated [DMCA] extortion racket system based on outdated law that cannot keep up with the intricacies of what we’re all experiencing.”

[20:44 - 21:13] Sabretooth thinks that, while there might be more NFT art platforms, most of them are centralized platforms that are subject to US laws.

[20:46 - 24:32] Max had a negative visceral reaction to the announcement on OpenSea that Coca-Cola had dropped their first NFT. Fears that crypto art could become corporatized just like almost everything else in the modern world.

[24:34 - 27:17] Max worries that world governments and banks can, through loans, own a company’s resources including their people. Refers to this as “modern version of slavery”.

Feels artists must unite to resist “the old systems” taking over the NFT market.

Thinks crypto will promote more creativity and help more artists earn more, no matter where they are in the world.

[27:18 - 30:51] Max is looking forward to projects using crypto to restore the world.

Has downloaded the Cosmos framework and is looking forward to developing his own blockchain and contract which will allow the “ethos of the individual” to align with nature.

Hopes to be able to have a smart contract that will automatically use whatever wealth he can aggregate to fund worthwhile projects such as people planting natural food in their neighbourhoods, helping remediate the land, etc.

Iterates that we need to restore our habitat and our relationships with our fellow human beings.

$TRSH art series 1/3 - Is $TRSH art the most important NFT movement? Interview with Eric Paul Rhodes

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode interview with Eric Paul Rhodes, find his twitter Second Realm and his blog at The Outer Realm

Time Stamps

[1:03 - 1:53] Eric fell down the NFT crypto art rabbit hole on twitter and was introduced to artists such as X Copy , Coldy, Robness, maxosiris, Jay Delay.

[2:10 - 4:12] Wanted to become a TRSH art historian because he saw the narrative was being shifted after the fact, he wanted to give an unbiased 5000 foot overview of the movement

https://www.theouterrealm.io/blog/a-short-history-of-nft-trash-art

https://www.theouterrealm.io/blog/the-origins-of-trash-art

Darren Kleine first wrote about it.

https://cointelegraph.com/magazine/2020/03/24/immutable-trash-crypto-art-censorship-meaning

[4:26 - 9:31] TRSH art movement came about because the whales of SuperRare specifically led by Whaleshark were determining what was eligible to be on the platform. A lot of artists that didn't meet a certain aesthetic criteria was pushed off the platform. Eric felt that Superrare sided with the whales and not the artists. j1mmyeth was the one who coined the term $TRSH Art. Eric led a mass exodus of artists to the Rarible platform, having it gain in popularity.

[10:08 - 13:04] Trash art is a decentralised movement which has evolved and shaped the current NFT space. The idea of limited or no gatekeeping on platforms today is heavily because of trash artists pushed back and meme'd their way to victory. Comprises 3 main areas today, the idea of openness and onboarding as many people as possible into the NFT space, the meme of the trash can, and the aesthetics of glitchy appropriation art.

[13:19 - 16:43] Trash art movement's fight against gatekeeping will go into the history books alongside the impressionists movement and the dadaists movement. The similarities are that the terms Trash artist and Impressionist were both derogatory terms that were reclaimed. Even though the artists were only together for a short time, their impact were felt long after they had gone their separate ways. Case in point, today, SuperRare is full of trash art.

[17:17 - 19:51] Eric started out as an anon but chose to doxx himself as an artist because he didn't want to pretend to be a persona. The NFT space has opened to him a lot more since he became doxxed.

[20:11 - 23:56] Eric thinks artists always reveal what they want about themselves and that anonymity that is common in NFTs allows a certain performance aspect of the artist persona that is somewhat unique. he thinks Pak is a team of people, and doesn't respect them as an artist in the NFT space. Xcopy is an example of the anonymity as adding a performance quality to the art. Thinks in some ways that this has always been the case, cites Leonardo Da Vinci as someone who has been credited with a lot of inventions that might not be invented by him but merely documented.

[24:28 - 23:38]

Loves the attention that profile picture NFT projects bring to the NFT space. Didn't see the big deal about cryptopunks, had many chances to collect them but didn't see it blowing up. Didn't see that cryptopunks turning into clout chasing decentralised social media.

Thinks that art is being pushed to the outskirts a bit with all the attention on collectibles.

The next big innovation will be the merger between collectability and utility.

[28:46 - 33:04]

Launched his own unofficial punks because he was priced out of the cryptopunks excitement. It was natural to make his own unofficial punk that took 5minutes to make but blew up and went viral. Eric is an appropriation artist. So he started making more and made a collection of 100 pieces. Stopped doing it because he felt he wasn't doing it to express himself but to make things that people wanted to buy. Unofficial punks movement gave people permission to make their own unofficial punks.

[33:20 - 38:28] Feels like multiple artists that have been attributed with a "certain" signature style may not be the case on a closer examination such as Andy Warhol and Salvador Dali. Doesn't feel the need to conform to a signature style because his through thread for his work is his personal experience. Another similar artist is Kevin Abosch. Feels that people who say you must have a signature style in order to succeed are painting a narrative not based on fact.

Manolo Gamboa Naon - Generative artist series 6/6 - Old School Self-Curation Generative Artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 30 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

This is an 6 episode series on generative artists who we found interesting. 6 artists in total who we found contributes something unique in the current generative art landscape, they span different blockchains/platforms/aesthetics/personal histories.

Show Notes;

Artist Curated generative art rather than using the now popular Drop mechanic. His art is sold more traditionally similar to Fine Art NFTs.
Manolo is able to generate generative works that are similar to the style of Kadinsky, Max Ernst, Delaunay, are the machines going to take over?
Kizu makes fun of Sabretooth calling himself a serious collector
Is generative art going to emerge as the defining art style of this era?

Manolo Gamboa Naon SuperRare;

https://superrare.com/manoloide

Artnome article on Manolo;

https://www.artnome.com/news/2018/8/8/generative-art-finds-its-prodigy

Kjetil Golid - Generative artist series 5/6 - OG artblocks generative artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Fri, 27 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Show Notes;

Kjetil's Archetypes was Fidenza before Fidenza, his paper armadas drop sat for weeks without selling out.
Kizu says his favourite Kjetil work is his self-curated "Dual" 1/1s, explores the difference between random curation ala art blocks and artist curation, old school vs new school generative art.

Kjetil Golid Twitter;

https://twitter.com/kGolid

https://generated.space/

Paper Armadas;

https://opensea.io/assets/art-blocks-playground?search[stringTraits][0][name]=Paper%20Armada&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20Paper%20Armadas

Archetype;

https://opensea.io/assets/art-blocks?search[stringTraits][0][name]=Archetype&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20Archetypes

Matt Deslauriers - Generative artist series 4/6 - A new breed of coder entering generative art NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Wed, 25 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Show notes;

Matt's drops Subscapes on Artblocks, but also drops companion pieces on HEN at the same time, one of the first instances of multi-platform drops.
How Matt is a new breed of coders who come into NFTs not from a "maxi" tech background but more platform/chain agnostic.

Matt Deslauriers website;

https://www.mattdesl.com/

Subscapes on Opensea

https://opensea.io/collection/art-blocks?search[sortAscending]=true&search[sortBy]=PRICE&search[stringTraits][0][name]=Subscapes&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20Subscapes

Matt's HEN site

https://www.hicetnunc.xyz/tz/tz1XHADaUcMSkTN9gdmtRqcnrrZfs4tNkCPg

Subscapes companion pieces on HEN;

https://www.hicetnunc.xyz/objkt/72424

https://www.hicetnunc.xyz/objkt/72420

Tyler Hobbs - Generative artist series 3/6 - Fidenza sets records in secondary sales

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Episode Notes;

Fidenza has the classical generative art aesthetics that current collectors love, it set records of how fast the price has appeciated on secondary markets.
The collection contains multiple visual styles in the same collection, calls into the question the whole concept of categorising art visually.
Discuss secondary market premiums for pieces, and how great communication ability like Tyler does on social media can translate to secondary market premiums.

Tyler Hobbs twitter;

https://twitter.com/tylerxhobbs

The rise of Long-Form Generative Art;

https://tylerxhobbs.com/essays/2021/the-rise-of-long-form-generative-art

Fidenza on Opensea;

https://opensea.io/assets/art-blocks?search[stringTraits][0][name]=Fidenza&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20Fidenzas

Rafaël Rozendaal - Generative artist series 2/6 - Net Art OG turns to NFT generative Art

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 19 Aug 2021 19:00:00 +0800

Episode Notes;

Rafaël's Artblocks drop was the first one where Artblocks moved from a gas war drop to a dutch auction drop.
Kizu talks about Rafaël's net art OG status and what he talked about in interviews way back.
Sabretooth talks about the trend of net art OGs coming to NFTs including the genesis episode John Karel
Comparing the visuals of Endless Nameless to Tyler Hobbs Fidenza drop and how it's not a classically generative art aesthetic.

Rafaël Rozendaal's Endless Nameless Arblocks series;

https://opensea.io/assets/art-blocks?search[stringTraits][0][name]=Endless%20Nameless&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20Endless%20Nameless

Rafaël Rozendaal's Twitter;

https://twitter.com/newrafael

Rafaël Rozendaal's Net Art:

http://papertoilet.com/

https://trashloop.com

Shvembldr - Generative artist series 1/6 - Small time HEN artist to major league platform builder

Floor is Rising Podcast — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0800

Episode Notes;

Rags to riches story, started off dropping pieces for only $3-$10 per piece in HEN, now his works are selling for $20,000+
Parallels to career development in trad art where artists move from smaller galleries to super galleries
Comparison between selling individual pieces of a generative algorithm, vs selling the generator itself, Shvembldr has done both.
Kizu talks about Picasso's sculptures and how they illustrate a point about current art drops.
Sabretooth talks about how the lootbox mechanic in generative art drops bridges the two worlds of collectible NFTs and Fine Art NFTs.

Shvembldr's The blocks of Art series;

https://opensea.io/collection/art-blocks?search[sortAscending]=true&search[sortBy]=PRICE&search[stringTraits][0][name]=The%20Blocks%20of%20Art&search[stringTraits][0][values][0]=All%20The%20Blocks%20of%20Arts

Shvembldr's HEN generative art

https://www.hicetnunc.xyz/Shvembldr/creations

Shvembldr twitter;

https://twitter.com/shvembldr

Malaysian NFT Artist - Chong yan Chuah - Architect turned Artist

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 12 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

8 min 31 sec

Malaysian Artist Chong Yan Chuah

Traditional artist that is dipping his toes into NFT market, very tech heavy traditional artist
Kizu discusses artist's style and how that is translating to NFTs
Sabretooth disagrees on the NFT strategy of artist, discusses nuances to how an artist positions themselves within the NFT space

Chong Yan Chuah's website

https://chongyanchuah.com/

Indonesian NFT Artist - hariprast - comic book turned NFTs

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 09 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

9 min 59 sec Episode;

Hariprast's comic book illustration style and how it translates to NFTs
Comparison of what is happening on NFT platforms like Hic Et Nunc to the MMA(mixed martial arts) invention in the 90s
Specifically how comic book artists have monetized in the past in countries like Japan and what it looks like now with NFTs.

Hariprast's twitter;

https://twitter.com/hariprast/

Singaporean NFT artist - Shavonne Wong - Photography

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 05 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

10 min 13 sec episode

Shavonne's career as a commercially successful photographer and how she transitioned into a NFT career
How she has ported her practise from trad art to NFT world and the efforts to be more "medium native"
Price differences between photography NFTs vs prices at art fairs
What other successful traditional artists can learn from Shavonne's move into NFTs

EDIT:

Shavonne reached out to us to clarify some things in the episode;

Shavonne's NFT works are not animated photography. They are done using realistic 3D virtual models.

The 14/21ETH listing on Foundation are secondary sales listing not primary sales.

Shavonne's photography comes from a fashion and commercial background, not through traditional art galleries. Hence it's a brand new practice built on the experience and background of a fashion photography career.

Additional links about Shavonne

sg.asiatatler.com/life/singapore…

straitstimes.com/life/arts/as-t…

allships.co/article/interv…

businesstimes.com.sg/lifestyle/feat…

Ethereum Generative Art projects: Framergence + Pulsquares - The mysterious pseudonymous Arihz

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 09:00:00 +0800

15 min 57 second episode;

History of Framergence and how the genesis minting came about
The deflationary mechanics of both Framergence and Pulsquares and how it works
A stylistic comparison of the aesthetics of Framergence to early internet art and how the generative genre could develop similar to internet art
How onchain generative art compares with offchain generative art
How the valuation of generative art reminds of cutting edge avante garde art from the 60s by artists like Allan Kaprow
Kizu finds the constellations mechanic in Pulsquares disappointing visually
Discuss the recent price surge in both Framergence and Pulsquares and what that means for the generative art market going forward

Arihz's projects on Ethereum

https://pulsquares.art/

https://framergence.art/

https://avidlines.art/

Indonesian Artist - Diela Maharanie is one woman brand

Floor is Rising Podcast — Thu, 29 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0800

8 minutes 52 second Episode

Diela's style and how it expands across objkts into objects
How Diela's brand building in Indonesia is a result of pioneers like Murakami
Diela is a self taught artist, exploring what that means not just in terms of style but also commercial paths

Diela's twitter.

https://twitter.com/dielamaharanie

Filipino NFT scene - Bjorn Calleja + Axie stories

Floor is Rising Podcast — Mon, 26 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Short episode 8:31

How Bjorn's NFT style is very contemporaneous and represents a certain art culture from modern Philippines.
Comparison of the Filipino art scene to other neighbouring countries and both stylistic and structural similarities and differences
The Filipino NFT scene and talking about the impact of Axie Infinity the game has on the country and specifically Gabby Dizon's Yield Guild

Links of resources mentioned in podcast

Bjorn Calleja

https://linktr.ee/bjorncalleja

Gabby Dizon

https://twitter.com/gabusch

Axie infinity

https://axieinfinity.com/

Emergency $20m Damien Hirst "The Currency" Drop episode

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sun, 18 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Damien Hirst released a $20m drop called "The currency" on Heni.com. Sabretooth and Kizu review the drop and discuss;

The $2000 per piece and $20m project price tag, is it worth it?
How the art of "The currency" fits with the historical context of Hirst's works
The possible motivations of Hirst to do an NFT drop at this stage in his career
The possible emergence of NFT vs Crypto market cycle timings
The gatekeeping mechanism in this drop vs traditional art scene
The mechanics of the interaction between the NFT and Physical prints in this drop and how to think about the game theory involved.
The problems associated with bridging NFTs across blockchains
PREDICTIONS: Which pieces are going to worth the most
PREDICTIONS: Which traits will drive price appreciation

Price Manipulation in NFTs, What is it and how is it done.

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sat, 10 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Podcast summary service @Thereadingape did a good summary of this podcast

https://thereadingape.substack.com/p/floor-is-rising-ep-4-price-manipulationWhy nobody wants to talk about it.

It's not much discussion because
Promoters of NFTs don't want to talk about this because it will damage the NFT market
Others just don't collect enough NFTs to know anything about this
Beeple's history making sale 5000 Days involved a multi-month plan to increase the hype and prices around Beeple.
The rise of pricing for Cryptopunks with stories of specific celebrities who raised the floor with their purchases.
Gatekeeping methods in the traditional art markets will come into play in cryptoart markets as well.

Murat Pak's Sotheby's single pixel sale, is it the Crypto version of Cattelan's Banana on a wall?

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sat, 03 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Murat Pak's Sotheby's Single Pixel sale. Is it similar to Cattelan's Banana on a wall?

How Christie's and Sotheby's are positioning themselves into different camps already when it comes to types of NFT art and artists.

Is Pak boxed in by the genre of Art he is doing?

How was Pak's debut piece on Hic Et Nunc received?

Is Brazil the new NFT powerhouse? Reviews of @fiedler_jpg @estelle_flores_ @eventualghost @blackcollage_

Floor is Rising Podcast — Sat, 19 Jun 2021 09:00:00 +0800

We look at 4 Brazilian artists and discuss their art and NFT styles.

Transcript below;

[0:05] Sabretooth:

Welcome to the floor is rising, I'm Sabretooth with me is Kizu. Today we're going

to talk about Brazilian art, Hic et Nunc, was founded by Raphael Lima, who is

Brazilian. And some of the most interesting artists on the platform are also

Brazilian. Definitely not a country that is usually associated with sort of emerging

art or very interesting art. But in the NFT world, and especially Hic et Nunc, they

are a, I would say, a dominant presence on the platform. And none other than

probably one of the most popular artists anywhere, not just on Hic et Nunc but

belting all of NFT is Fiedler, who is a Brazilian artist that from a sales perspective is

basically selling out the moment that he drops anything, his secondary sales is

very, very strong. And not just on Hic et Nunc, but also on ethereum and opensea

as well. And I want to throw it to you Kizu. What do you think of Fiedler?

[1:12] Kizu:

Well, I would dispute what you said about Braziil not being a usual suspect in

terms of contemporary, I think maybe at the moment, early 2020s 2010s. Yeah,

it's been a bit quieter, I think. But I would say that Brazil has always been a very

strong creative force, maybe not in the fine art world, I just want to give that kind

of overview. I think that there's obviously a huge country in the pig population, a

lot of intersecting cultures, he's got a very patchy and checkered history of

colonialism, very kind of tense divide between haves, have nots, black culture,

white culture, kind of that mix. So you know, I think that's very fertile ground for

creatives and artists. But to come back to 2021 where we are, I think that the the

fact that the founder being Brazilian has a little bit to do with that. So I think that

helps to know that there's a kind of community that's sprung out of that. But to

go to the art specifically, I think that it's an aesthetic that I was trying to put my

finger on. It's reminiscent of many other both Fine Art idioms, as well as more

poster art, comic art kind of styles. The one thing that actually jumps into my

mind right away actually was, I don't know if you're familiar with the Australian

kind of surf brand Mambo, which started out in the 80s. I think it came out of

Australian post punk scene. So there was obviously the music influence. And I

think if you look at a lot of kind of more sub cultural art styles, historically, I think

they always encompass something else, like whether it was skate culture, or punk

music and stuff like that. So obviously, I think the color scheme is a bit different.

The style is obviously a little bit different. Well, it's the kind of thing that like if as

a 14 year old with a skateboard and you came back home, with a T-shirt with one

of these motifs, your mom would not be very pleased, it's that kind of thing. I

think Fiedler, obviously he has a very strong kind of technology or like

smartphone addiction, dopamine kind of thing going on. It's certainly not hyper

sexualized, I think. But there are some very, like crude facial expressions, the way

that the human figures appear and stuff like that. The colors are very appealing,

kind of acid blue, pink, neon yellow. So I think that it's a very kind of appealing

and it grabs you right away the aesthetic. I think it also translates very well to a

screen. I think that's one of the key things.

[3:39] Sabretooth:

How do you see Fiedler as sort of art? How do you think that ages, you know, into

the future? I mean, do you think that him being one of the predominant digital

slash NFT artists, do you think that his works will influence people in however

many years that we're talking about into the future?

[4:03] Kizu:

It's a good question. In one sense, it's very contemporary. So in terms of the

motifs and things, there's a sense that his characters are being inundated or

absorbed by technology. Some of the characters are like half Cyborg, with all

these smartphones wired into their brain that speaks very much to contemporary

kind of digital smartphone screen culture. On the other hand, like his choice of

style, like I said, it goes back to kind of this post punk, comic influenced style. To

connect your question, I think it's on the one hand, it's very backward looking

retro in terms of the visual aesthetic, and at the same time, content wise, yeah,

you could argue that it is quite contemporary. I would say that Fiedler is very

popular, but I think that people have not really gotten their heads around what is

possible with NFTs and the idea of tokenization. So yeah, I think that's something

that you know, we'll see in the coming months and years, maybe in terms of

whether It'll age, as you say, well or not.

[5:02] Sabretooth:

Let's move on to the second artist, this Brazilian artist that we want to talk about.

And this is one that I think is one of the more interesting artists, both in terms of

her backstory, but also in terms of her art. Let me set the ground here. So Estelle

Flores, she's been interviewed in a lot of articles about Hic et Nunc. And you

know, the story is she was kind of struggling to pay rent. And then she discovered

the platform, and she was able to sell NFT art on the platform. Kind of created an

income that she was able to sustain herself. That's kind of the backstory. And

that's, I would say, that's probably one of the dream stories, so to speak for a lot

of creatives who sort of see NFT as being an outlet to be able to sort of monetize

their creativity. So that's one side of it. But the second side of which I thought was

very interesting is the kind of art that she does. Her art on the platform is

exclusively arts generated from inside the Sims Four game. So she knows she

takes her game and she positions a character does like a setting, and then sort of

creates a piece she sells. So I thought it was pretty unique and interested to hear

what your thoughts are on that.

[6:15] Kizu:

Yeah, so there's something there I think that is very powerful. The idea that, you

know, the underdog, or artists that, artists from less developed parts of the world

that may have been excluded from a traditional art infrastructure, that includes

things like galleries and auction houses, I think that's very powerful narrative. You

know, I think that first bit about her identity as a kind of more marginalized artist,

in terms of her background, I think it's something that's familiar to all of us. The

second part, she got her start making pieces entirely out of a game, right, is again,

I would say that's a natural extension of how these creative industries work,

right? I mean, if you look at for example, I think Japan provides a very good

historical case on that fact. So in Japan, there's this acronym, they call it ACG,

right? Animation comics game, ACG. And it refers to this kind of trio of creative

industries that traditionally have always kind of spawned versions of each other in

the sense that you might have an original manga comic, then, you know, someone

made an animated movie feature film, like out of it, and then you know, there's a

game that came out of it. And that's not discounting the merch that comes later

on or theme parks spawn entire empires based on a few characters from what

was originally like a comic, right. So I think that now we're seeing obviously, that

artists are well not taking advantage of that, but I think that the logic of NFTs, as a

lot of people have noted already is has been embedded in gaming, they

incentivize players. So I think that artists that are working within this idiom, it

makes a lot of sense, because in games, you design characters, and it provides a

ready-made kind of visual style, right? In this age where a lot of people have

commented that I think, with NFTs is that the lack of that local context, but of

course, it's not a physical one. It's all the twitterverse that pops up around it. In

Estelle's case, the Sims actually is the context in the sense that you know, it exists

entirely online. Sabretooth I don't know if you are a big gamer yourself and

whether you agree with that in terms of how games can actually provide the

context for NFT artists. What do you think of that?

[8:38] Sabretooth:

I'm not sure that's the thing because in the Japanese animated example, it's all

about, you know, fans of that particular franchise. In Estelle's case, she's not

licensed by Sims Four to create NFTs, it seems to be that the game is some sort of

Canvas for her to exercise her her creativity and that the consumers of those NFTs

might not necessarily be super fans of the game. I mean, this is conjecture so I'm

not really sure.

[9:10] Kizu:

Yeah, even if you were able to speak to collectors of her work and ask why, what

drew you to her and whether or not they're aware of the game that she's born

from. But I think again, that's really not our business. I think it's, I put that point

across more to suggest what art scenes might look like, in the age of NFTs. In the

absence of a physical context. So online on Hic et Nunc and all these platforms,

what are the kind of references. All these artists that you know, you look at the

Twitter and you follow on Instagram and things like that. And then so if she says

that, you know, she's a visual artist painting on Sims Four, like, Oh, what is that

and you're not familiar with the game you check it out. So it's just one other thing

I think that people can, that potential collectors can find out more about and

whether or not it then figures into their decision it's, you know, that's a separate

question.

[10:08] Sabretooth:

Let's talk about another Brazilian artist Gio Mariani. So he outwardly identifies as

queer and he's art is probably I would say one of the sort of the most popular

forms of art in NFTs, which is pixel art. Right. But he approaches pixel art in a

pretty different way than most. It's not really into sort of characters or that sort of

thing, but more about using pixel art to demonstrate concepts, emotions, some of

it political and some of it socio-political, what do you think of Gio Mariani's art?

[10:43] Kizu:

So I think in the traditional art world, a lot of times when we talk about queer

artists, the understanding is that these artists make work about their identity, or

rather, that they actually center it on their queer identities. So you know, it's hard

to run away from that. I think that you have people like Gio here who showcase

their work on this platform, and I'm not familiar with his work, so based on what

I've seen here it doesn't address those queer specific issues in that sense. And of

course, it's not something that is somehow de rigueur or expected of the artist.

The work itself, I think, is interesting in the sense that the motifs are a bit more

opaque, I would say in the sense that there are figurative elements. I'm not saying

that it's abstract, but what I'm saying is that it's as compared to someone like

Fiedler where it's more in your face, obviously, and the message is quite clear.

There's something very quiet and like, kind of ambiguous about . the way that Gio

creates his work. I think it's not entirely clear what the subjects are, what the

inspirations are, the motifs are a bit opaque to the casual observer. So yeah, I

think he's got a quite an interesting style. And maybe it would be the kind of thing

that would reward someone who is interested in decoding what this kind of

personal symbolism might mean as an art.

[12:05] Sabretooth:

Cool. And our final artist that we want to talk about today is Thais Silva. So she's a

Afrofuturist type of art, which I believe is kind of in vogue right now. What do you

think of her?

[12:20] Kizu:

Again, just to put it out there in terms of terminology, Afrofuturism. Sabretooth, I

think maybe what you're thinking about is more of, kind of 2010s vogue for both

African Americans, black artists, as well as African artists from Africa, that have

done very well in the traditional art world in US and Europe, and was a definite

narrative in the past 10 years. I think it had a lot to do with the fact that ambitious

gallerists were looking for the next big thing. And even though Asian art was a

thing, they were looking for more, you know, like, artists from the Caribbean,

from Kenya, basically, the African countries that were less on the radar. And that

did happen. And there were many kind of retrospectives that have top galleries,

and then secondary sales were strong as well. But that was not really, I think,

where the term Arofuturism came from. I believe it dates from the 60s jazz scene,

actually and to a certain extent, visual artists that, you know, for example, design

the posters and the visuals for these artists. It's kind of like, well, I think not so

much John Coltrane but people like Sun Ra and more. I think a lot of it was kind of

a mix of jazz and funk. Obviously, this is when the more you had synthesizers and

stuff like that, so the kind of sound of music was changing to more electronic one.

And I think that the musicians that were active in the scene, were going for a

sound that to them conveyed a future where, you know, African identity, African

Americans in particular could really fulfill their, you know, creative potential and

become very successful. So I think that's the context. But again, obviously, in a

visual art context, there were all these artists that did produce division, you know,

this is a time when the album art was a huge thing, like it made or broke the

album, if you had very strong. Because the, the consumer would be buying the

music, but who would be buying the LP and then you have this very interesting

graphic design for the poster, for example. So I think that maybe that's where Thais Silva's

coming from. I can already see how some of the works on hand here

might make a very strong album cover in terms of the kind of simplifying

geometric forms kind of restricted color palette, but very strong kind of graphic,

sharp graphic sensibility, I think. So yeah, I'm not sure exactly like what her

political position is in terms of like how she sees herself as a black Brazilian artist.

And in the Brazilian context, obviously, I think that's a very powerful political, or

social, economic and political narrative. But just based purely on her work, I think,

yeah, it draws on that legacy of historical Afrofuturism.

[15:27] Sabretooth:

In the NFT sort of crypto context, sort o f Afrofuturism is a more literal thing

recently. I mean, because you know, the dominant, I would say, theme in crypto

art, currently is futurism. Right? If you browse the top sales of any platform, you'll

find most of it dominated by sort of futuristic looking art, whether it's futuristic

looking world, futuristic, looking 3d renders futuristic looking spaceships, or cars

always about futurism, for certain extent. And it's a self fulfilling sort of loop in

the sense that if a futuristic themed art sells well, then it either attracts artists

who were into that kind of thing, or, you know, artists who want to sell, produce

those kind of works, and those works definitely do kind of sell. But then at the

same time, it merges with artists who bring their own sort of political slash, sort

of social history with them. And part of that is, is a lot of the sort of the racial

politics of the racial tensions that's occurring, not just in creative world but just

also in society in general, over the past few years, you know, with Black Lives

Matter, and Trump and all that kind of stuff. I think Afrofuturism in the NFT world

is just a more literal combination of those two kind of things.

[16:58] Kizu:

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. I just wanted to point out the kind of

historical etimology specific of the term. I think that what's been happening in the

past 10 years and the truth our and right now, as we speak, in the NFT space is

absolutely an extension of what happened in the jazz and funk scene in the 60s,

right? Obviously, the mediums have shifted, and it's not always been about visual

art, specifically, but I think it's been definitely a very strong questioning of like,

what is African and African American creativity, right. And the platforms that are

available today, and the fact that we're talking about Brazil on Hic et Nunc today,

testifies to that, in the sense that the Brazilian presence on this platform speaks

to the fact that, you know, it is the artists from not just like African or countries

with the kind of considerable indigenous or population of African origin. I think it's

absolutely about that identity and how it comes to bear in the ways that these

artists engage with their market, with their audience with their collectors.

[18:07] Sabretooth:

Cool. So let's wrap up this episode about Brazilian artists. Is there anything you

want to say to sort of sum up? Is there a Brazilian sort of aesthetic? Is there a

Brazilian style? What do you think?

[18:21] Kizu:

Yeah, well, I think we mentioned a little bit, especially in relation to Fiedler at the

start. In terms of influences and then obviously Estelle Flores who draws from the

visual idiom of game, and Gio Mariani, the queer artist whose work isn't

superficially isn't very queer issue focused, and then Thais Silva obviously has this

afrofuturism narrative. So I think we've looked at a very interesting mix of styles,

just within this group of four artists, so it's really hard to generalize. I think one

thing that's come up, though, is that, and I think, with the last discussion about Thais Silva, and afrofuturism, is that it is very Brazilian in the sense that, you know, it's

tied to a lot of issues facing Brazil as a country in 2021. And whether that's got to

do mostly with an emerging, less developed country that you know, is rapidly

becoming an international force in, in many areas, or whether that's a coming of

age, or if it's artists that are engaging this as as ties along with with issues of, you

know, the identity of its artists. I think that there are a lot of ways in which you

can see, I wouldn't call...

Is NFT artist John Karel the next Beeple?

Sabretooth & Kizu — Sun, 30 May 2021 09:00:00 +0800

Everyone has heard of Beeple, but not many people have heard of John Karel. The hottest NFT platform currently is not on Ethereum but on Tezos. HicEtNunc.xyz is the platform. We talk about Karel and his move from Ethereum to Tezos and how climate change plays a crucial role in the move.

We also discuss the aesthetics of John Karel's artistic style. What influences we see in it.

We talk about how John Karel has in such a short space of time become influential within the artists that make up the HEN collective.

Transcript Below;

----------------------------------

Sabretooth:

Welcome to the Floor is rising podcast. We talked about NFTs I'm sabretooth with me is Kizu.

Kizu:

So today's topic is really about another artist that has been very active in generating a lot of attention. For his art on a different platform. And that artist is John Karel.

He has basically been the, hot new property on the block. I think his artistic style is one of the things obviously, but I think a lot of, attention has also been paid to the platform that he's active on, which is a Hic Et Nunc, which is Latin for here and now,

hic Et Nunc which has been abbreviated to hen or hen. And specifically the blockchain and the token that it's being active on is, Tezos.

Sabretooth:

Tezos, is one of those OG layer, one blockchains. They did their ICO, you know, ancient like six years ago to 2015, I believe raised around $500 million. And basically since then, no, one's heard a peep about. basically anything happening there. Most people have kind of written them off. And lo and behold, in sort of Feb, March of this year, 2021, this sort of platform, Hic Et Nunc, just comes roaring on the scene.

Basically out of nowhere. And as of today a lot of people say that it's sort of, up there with open sea as the largest NFT platform in the world, essentially. And a very unlikely story to come out of Tezos. No one knows exactly how and why it became so popular, but the topic for today's conversation, John Karel I think personally is somewhat responsible for that popularity. I mean, he was. Quite early on the platform.

Kizu:

I think that there's a bit of a deja VU element I think, in, in Karel's work. That's not to say that, you know, Beeple's work isn't derivative or doesn't have references to, you know, early two thousands, 2010s internet culture, which it does, obviously.

I think that's very much foregrounded and I think it's a big part of. The way that it's resonated with particular than slightly younger gen YZ demographic. And I think there's something similar in John Karel except that I think that the kind of timeframe that's referenced is a little bit earlier.

Specifically, if Beeple is more like a 2010s meme based kind of, aesthetic, I think Karel's is about 10 years prior to that, I think there's a, there's an early two thousands Y2K kind of like retro computer graphics. Very strong style to that. Obviously a lot of the works are animated, kind of GIF like things.

There's obviously some similarities with Beeple but there's a little bit more of a hearkening back retro element specifically I would say. And I think that he's mentioned this in interviews. He's very cognizant of these references and specifically this timeframe at the same time, he does seem to be very aware of pop artists that have dealt with similar material specifically pop art from the sixties, like Warhol, Oldenburg.

I think the color palette is pop, it translates well on the screen. The more vital elements, I think with any NFTs, it's obviously a visual medium, specifically it performs well on a screen as opposed to obviously like a canvas .

There's a flatness to it. Perspective wise, it's quite flat and it's pixilated. All of those things identify it, as a kind of like internet native or screen native medium. He's known for the series with a skeleton .

That's just one of his main characters. The color scheme skews purple light blue, pastel green. It reminds me a little bit of the Vaporwave aesthetic, which was actually also tied to specifically pop music that was slowed down to half, three quarters.

Its original speed. A lot of it was eighties, nineties, dance music. Like Y2K, not so much the anxiety or the paranoia element, but the dominant style and the resolution and the visual limitations and quirks of that time.

So I think these are all coming together in a very familiar way.

Sabretooth:

He is now, undoubtedly the best-selling artist on HEN. I dug into sort of that history and his first foray into crypto art

it wasn't actually on Tezos or HEN. He was an artist that was selling on Ethereum based platforms, Rarible. He was successful artists on Ethereum and then sometime in early March there was criticism of NFTs as beings not climate friendly.

There was a narrative going around. And I noticed his Twitter on John Karel's Twitter that nearly every single post that he made, there would always be one or two people there in the comments, reminding him about the anti climate factor for the minting NFTs on Ethereum, as of right now is still a proof of work blockchain.

It took him a week or so and he basically made the decision to stop minting NFTs on Ethereum and move to HEN, Hic Et Nunc, which at that point was a very, very niche, very small NFT platform on Tezos.

His first mint was about the two thousands NFT that was Minted on the platform. And right now that's sitting around 90,000. So it was very, very early on. Looking at the prices that he was selling for. On Ethereum versus what he was selling for on hen at the time, I think he definitely took a monetary hit in the beginning to, to do that.

I think , a huge part of his popularity or due to his art, of course, but also, you know, the fact that he brought some of these existing fans from Ethereum into Tezos. And the fact that he kind of took that political stand. On the clean NFT Issue, I think had a lot to do with galvanizing , his popularity.

He just took off

Kizu:

Would you say that was primarily. The reason for his popularity, or do you think that it was very timely that he kind of jumped on the hen bandwagon at a time when Twitter discourse was very conscious of energy and environment related issues.

Sabretooth:

No. I mean, I wouldn't say that's the primary reason. Because he was a pretty successful artists. I mean, he wasn't like the most successful artists on ethereum, but he was a pretty successful artist on ethereum and he was selling his one-to-one work for around one to two ETH he's editions going for like 0.1.

So it's pretty respectable prices. Not like Beeple level prices, but pretty respectable prices. What made that move better in hindsight is that it wasn't jumping on a bandwagon because at that stage, HEN wasn't really a Bandwagon and it was a Go Kart. He made the switch. I think definitely contributed to HEN's sort of increasing popularity. The narrative of the clean NFT even though it wasn't started by him definitely was enhanced by the fact that he made that switch.

He took a risk you know, it pays off because you're not really a bandwagon jumper. You're more sort of the Vanguard of the movement. So I think that definitely helps him because you know, art is very political. And I would say like that is a political statement that he made.

And, you know, people love political statements, especially if it's at the expense of money , you certainly couldn't say that you know, he did it to make more money.

Kizu:

What are the parallels between this kind of behaviour or the kind of shift of Karel towards the idea of Clean NFTs what a clean art work in the traditional art world would entail.

We distinguish between commercial and non-commercial platforms. So obviously, even though, you know, Open sea and so on are considered better or more insidious maybe because of environmental load compared to hen. And you know, that's not the discount.

The fact that yes, there is a political statement being made by artists like Karel that are shifting over. They're both essentially marketplaces. So I think the parallel in the art world, a traditional art world would be. Auction houses and galleries, for example. So I think there's some awareness of which galleries are the big and better ones and which are the more not to say non-commercial, but I think the ones that are more, you know, the support of underdogs, they take on artists that make work.

That's less commercial, not very sellable prices are lower but that are critically acclaimed and that get into the big festivals and be an right. Entry and alleys and things like that. So I think within, so within that commercial ecosystem, I think there's definitely some awareness on artists on the part of artists when they choose which galleries and dealers to work with, or if they choose, you know, specifically auction houses to, to consign their work to, I think there is some kind of field pick and choose there.

Allowing artists to make a political statement is when I think the best example would be when artists withdraw their work from exhibitions or events that they find politically objectionable.

So for example, if you have you know, a scandal with the board, or if there was some evidence that the chairman of that. Particular event or be an ally had made a racist or sexist misogynist statement

Sabretooth:

John Karel's made a lot of different stuff throughout his career. The dancing skeleton is just one of these more well-known sort of older works. But on HEN, he's a famous for his windows still life series, which is basically all his posted on HEN up to this point.

And it's become, I think almost like a blueprint for success. You can see a lot of other artists. Emulate not so much the windows, but the collectibleness of his decision for what to mint. Emulate the style the similarities from one artwork to the other emulate the descriptions and. Something that I've, haven't yet seen with other big artists, but essentially the whole platform of artists have paid tribute to him by minting their own window series. It was started by an artist by the name of Shvembldr.

Who's a Latvian generative artist one day decided to window tribute to, to John Karel and it just kind of took off and nearly every single artist. On the platform, has done their own John Karel tribute art work. And it, it really works because I've noticed that for a lot of these artists who are struggling to sell a lot of volume, that if they put out a good John Karel window tribute, that usually their best selling work.

Because all of John fans now want to collect it. And then. Pay for it. And John usually likes to support artists by re-tweeting it. And so it's become like this sort of initiation rite. For artists on the coming on to HEN to basically do a John Karel tribute.

Kizu:

The first thing that comes to mind actually is not necessarily art related. It's more fashion. And I speaking specifically of like knockoffs it's a bit early for Karel to be knocked off , granted he has a sort of yeah. Fan base and demographic who and who enjoys work.

But we're talking about an artist that has a very niche market and you know, more than that, the fact that he is. Popular artists with, you know, in a very circumscribed and limited context, which is that an NFT space, right? Granted before he was, as you mentioned before, he came onto hen, he was already quite popular, but still this is quite a it's quite a minority phenomenon, I would say.

So I think the fact that an artist of his stature within this limited space is. Being paid tribute by artists with this window phenomenon. I not sure that really speaks to the power of his brand rather than maybe the fact that because of the nature of NFTs, it.

lends itself very well to memes and kind of imitations and quotational , works that.

Kind of riff off other things. It's very referential. And if you look at say I mean, you look back at Beeple, a lot of the motifs and the characters were kind of insider jokes, particularly surrounding various aspects of internet or a meme culture. So I guess let's go. Yeah. So to answer your question, I think that, you know, we're seeing.

In fashion, you see brands being knocked off because they're so big. And that, you know, people who want a piece of that action, but can't pay the full price for all these branded goods. The goal for the knockoffs. And this is something a bit different because he's not really being knocked off, he's being referenced and paid tribute to and there's, you know, I think a similar, but yet very different dynamic going on there.

Sabretooth

It's kind of a phenomenon called trash art which the term itself came from crypto art. The artistic concept it's quite a bit older, he music especially with the rise of hip hop music where no, the entire genre is based on resampling other forms of music to create some new music. And the trash art movement is basically about re sampling, you know, existing art to, to make some new art.

And I think this, you know, John Karel has at various times has been called a trash art exponents. But I think this sort of resampling or remixing of John's still life windows motif is kind of like a classic sort of trash art genre pieces.

Kizu:

I think that's definitely true in the sense that It's happening independently of his mainstream appeal or recognition because a lot of this

Hip hop is a bit maybe different no hip hop artists is going to sample you like they want an additional credit or feat

on their byline . And that's how in general, I think mainstream recorded music works. You mentioned trash art. I think it is based on the fact that anything can really be remixed or be sampled and regardless of its mainstream endorsement or status .

That's something that I think is particularly more specific to internet native forms of expression, where there's no major and minor anymore. There's not really a sense that someone is mainstream or marginal or alternative. There's a flattening of value

for this windows phenomenon, the way the momentum that's built around certain artists and movements and aesthetics, has the potential to, propagate itself in a very different way it's quite distributed and it doesn't require the kind of official recognition from the establishment.

These movements seem to have a certain autonomy and if you have that momentum, then you can kind of operate independently. The windows phenomenon does speak very eloquently to the potential and the kind of media native aspects of NFT

Sabretooth

Kizu there's so much more we can talk about, but we're out of time. So, until next time

was a good one

Kizu

Have a good one.