MEXC Research: From 2D Art to Original Crypto Art, Brief Analysis on the Revolution Brought by NFT to Digital Art
Author: Will Wu
The subject of this article began at the end of March this year when Beeple, the digital artist’s “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” was sold at Christie’s auction for $69,346 thousand USD. The gavel’s bang triggered a storm across the cryptocurrency circle, traditional art circle, and the media to proclaim, “Such A High Price!”.
One of the animated art pieces named “CROSSROAD” was sold at 3,789.118 ETH, worth about $6.6 million USD at that time.
Many people have questioned how a picture in JPG and PNG format could be auctioned at such a high price one after another? It was remarkable.
On one side, people discussed the ownership of the artworks, a crypto art piece where whoever in possession of the“secret key” of the artwork can exercise the ownership of the particular artwork.
On the other hand, people thought that these “JPG” and “PNG” could be downloaded directly to be viewed anytime, anywhere with a similar viewing effect. So, why pay such a high price to buy “Ownership”?
Another problem is that these online crypto artworks are much less effective than the artworks that can be viewed offline, making it hard to cause the “David Syndrome”.
The three questions are all part of the same issue: Is On-chain Artwork a pseudo demand? This can be viewed from many perspectives.
We have put aside architectural art and statuary art to review the artwork of mankind. From Ancient Greek and Roman art to modern art, from the Renaissance period’s art to modern art, all human history condensed into a three-dimensional or even multi-dimensional space on a two-dimensional surface.
It was until people could use electricity, invent lights and movies. In creating contemporary art, artists are no longer limited to creations on two-dimensional planes, through the use of mechanical tools to create three- or more dimensional digital artworks through sound, lights, and electricity.
Beeple’s “Crossroad” is a 10-second animated crypto artwork. It might be difficult for the artists to fully express the “theme” they wanted if put on a two-dimensional surface. This is the most significant difference between digital art and traditional art is the carrying method.
In this case, by comparing digital art and traditional art, both are actually the two parallel universes of virtual and reality. The former has changed how art is carried and enjoyed, so the two types of art will produce two parallel markets.
In this way, NFT’s application in the crypto art field shows prominent importance. Why do we say so?
There are two types of crypto art at present; one is NFT-lizing (Art + NFT) traditional artworks, such as Injective Protocol, the blockchain company bought “Morons” for $95,000 USD from a British graffiti artist named Banksy at Taglialatella gallery in New York. The artwork was burned after NFT-lization later on, then the NFT version of “Morons” was successfully sold at 228.69 ETH.
For this kind of extreme behavior, we can call it the combination of traditional art and NFT. The other type is an original crypto art creation, where the artists create the digital art first and then NFT-lize the art.
For example, we will not make any comments on the artistic level of the artwork “Da Meeting”. The creator may follow the recreation of Angolo Bronzino’s famous work “An Allegory with Venus and Cupid”. (Note: Recreating does not mean imitating. There were many famous paintings and sculptures recreated based on the story of Venus and Cupid.)
Fontdona pulled out Venus and Cupid, placed them through Cyberpunk’s perspective, with the weightless astronaut that is moving. Similarly, if it was on a paper or board, the author will not be able to fully express what they want to deliver on such two-dimensional surfaces.
Other than Beeple’s “CROSSROAD” and Fontana’s “Da Meeting”, the crypto art websites are full of similar non-“traditional” art paintings. We can define these crypto artworks as original artworks.
For original crypto art, their uniqueness and immutability make the ownership matter particularly important. The authenticity identification of traditional artwork requires humane professionalism because the differences in personal experience, level, and tools will form different conclusions, leading to misjudgment. However, the uniqueness, authenticity, and ownership of crypto art must be beyond all doubts.
When compared to “Art+NFT”, original crypto art creations will never cause debates on “What is the meaning of On-chain” because original art itself is based on digital art.
From the above, we could see that: On-chain art is not necessarily a pseudo demand. However, NFT for native crypto art, the proof of demand is self-evident, and it will certainly bring forth a revolution.
Moreover, by comparing traditional art and digital art, crypto art has attributes such as authenticity, uniqueness, and rights, giving the crypto art collections worth and trading value.
This makes crypto art more universal than the previous digital art and not limited to a smaller crowd of people. In the past, we use to enjoy the artworks mostly by visiting offline art galleries, and the creator’s income had limitations. With the arrival of crypto art, more artists could sell their work online and generate income as more and more people become interested in crypto art, they can view and buy these unique artworks online.
At present, investors and media are focused on the prices of crypto art, not the crypto art itself. However, this does not necessarily mean a bad thing. On the contrary, these “fantastic” prices will greatly improve the willingness of more people to increase their appreciation level of artworks.
In addition to what we could see, there are many applications on NFT that we could not see.
For example, other than crypto art, there are NFT staking and mining, blockchain games, NFT-based entry tickets, NFT-based sports star cards, including the Metaverse concept that is trending recently.
We may not see how NFT’s future will prosper in the areas mentioned above, and it is more difficult to predict whether the other areas can be fruitful. Like the early days of the internet, many people could not predict the internet era today. In the early days of Bitcoin, only a few people have foreseen its future. Before 2019, a lot of people did not expect that ETH would develop into a settlement currency.
The internet, monopolized by giants monopolize, has grown involute, but the blockchain technology itself makes the blockchain industry full of more unknowns and possibilities, which is why NFT is so attractive.
Note: This article only represents the author’s personal views. It does not represent MEXC Research’s opinion and does not constitute any suggestions for making investments.
