The largest auction houses announce more and more auctions and sales of crypto art, and the Hermitage is preparing an exhibition of NFT works. Of course, it’s a gesture. If auctions, which have been making money on contemporary art for a long time, see severe financial potential in the crypt, then state museums are trying to fit into the current plan. And for those and others, it is a risk.
And for NFT, art is an act of institutionalization, the essential thing that can happen to art. After all, the central commandment of the 20th century is what is recognized by the art community as art – it is
With the growth of bitcoin (and only in 2020, it increased six times), the blockchain community significantly increased its income, and accordingly, there was a need to spend it. Why not on crypto art?
More and more artists, musicians, videographers, designers, and game creators are entering the blockchain technology field and are shaping the market right now. What for? To make money, out of curiosity, out of a need for this kind of statement, and – yes – out of a desire to make history. Today, NFT markets are thousands of players, and these numbers continue to grow. Who are they, NFT artists? And how to create NFT art?
Anyone with essential digital skills can create an NFT today. What is needed for this?
To get started, download a crypto wallet application (for example, MetaMask) to your browser or any smartphone, and fund your account (with ETH currency).
After that, you must log in to any NFT site using the wallet. For example, Rarible is one of the most accessible and democratic platforms. Founded in 2019 by Russians, today it is the fourth largest marketplace in the world, among other sites – Open Sea, Foundation, Cryptopunks, and Mintable. Subsequently, the crypto art created on such a site will be immediately tied to your wallet.
It is now – creating a token. You press the “create” button, upload your work there, write the title, and description, specify the section, and that’s it. Then there is that “magic,” which is no longer necessary to understand. This is the process of object tokenization and the so-called “minting” (minting) – the creation of a smart contract with a transaction record on the blockchain. This is a rather time-consuming operation that consumes a lot of energy and electricity (for which activists scold NFTts), so it is not free. Payment is made in “gas,” and its cost varies depending on the month, day of the week, time of day, etc. The average is $40-$100 (compared to $5-$10 a few months ago). When tokenization is completed, you have a token: you can assign a value to it and sell it.
But how to draw crypto art?
Most often, NFT artists are not artists in the strict sense of the word. These are, first of all, graphic, 3D designers. It is the easiest way for them to integrate into the space of crypto technologies. All roads are open if you are not a professional digital artist but have a good command of editors. Use whatever editor is available, often the familiar Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. NFT is not always about technical complexity.
The easiest but also unpleasant way is to use images from 3D stocks. The product will be non-authors, so you won’t have to count on a high reputation. And she is a precious asset in the NFT community.
In the classical sense, you can also create offline art – be an illustrator, a musician, or a creator. And also, based on offline objects, create tokens, having previously digitized your art object.
Almost anything can become NFT art. However, it would help if you did not rely on this. You will have to compete with professional 3D artists and stars from the art market. If your task is not just to create but to sell works and earn a name in the crypto art space, you will have to consider building social capital, creating a personal brand, and forming your unique visual language. Observation and social networks (primarily Twitter) will help you.
