Artists unite against NFTS

Gross profit Supporters say NFTS give creators better control over their work and more opportunities to make money. So why are many digital artists strongly against them, asks

Why are NFTS raising creatives’ hackles?

Digital artist Beeple sold a digital collage of his digital drawings for £50 million. The price paid at Christie’s auction house for Everydays – The First 5000 Days was the third-highest for work by a living artist. The buyer bought a nonfungible token – an NFT.

In May 2007, Beeple – aka Mike Winkelmann – started posting a daily drawing (“By posting the results online “I’m ‘less’ likely to throw down a big pile of ass-shit,” the American said). The collage sold in March 2021 is made of 5,000 images, which works out at about £10,000 per image. You can look at every one of these images (and right-click and save them, if you wanted to) on Beeple’s website (www.beeple-crap.com).

The NFT file doesn’t contain the collage itself. The NFT that the buyer purchased is similar to a contract or a certificate of ownership. Essentially, it says: “The owner of this NFT owns Everydays – The First 5000 Days.”

NEW KID ON THE BLOCK

A record of the buyer who bought this NFT is stored on a type of database called a blockchain. This is basically a big digital ledger, where any future changes of ownership will be publicly logged. This chain of ownership will be permanently marked in the file itself. You can right-click and save the collage Everydays – The First 5000 Days. You can right-click and save every last one of its individual images. But the NFT itself is pretty much impossible to copy or forge.

Chances are, if you’re reading this then you’ve had somebody right-click and save your own art. You’ve probably had somebody share or repost your work without proper credit or permission. Maybe you’ve even had somebody pass your work off as their own. So you’d have every right to see NFTS as a way for you to regain control of your art and maybe even make a little money doing it. You’re unlikely to make untold millions, but even a small fee is better than having your work taken from you for nothing, isn’t it?

“There is absolutely an issue of redistributing and sharing art without credit,” Catherine Graffam says. “However, I don’t think NFTS solve that problem. In a vacuum NFTS can appear like a solution to this. But in reality the money made from NFT sales, especially by new artists, won’t counter the fees associated with actually ‘minting’ NFTS.”

Catherine, an artists and art teacher, recently posted a Youtube video (http://ifxm.ag/c-graffam) titled NFTS (are worse than you thought) | ARTISTS BEWARE. Catherine included research by the Canadian

The money made from NFT sales won’t counter the fees associated with ‘minting’ NFTS

artist Kimberley Parker, who found that half of NFTS sold made less than the equivalent of $200, and 34 per cent sold for under $100. If you put an NFT up for sale for $100, the fees you’d be charged would be between 72.5 and 157.5 per cent of the sales price. That’s an average of 100.5 per cent which means an average loss of about $0.50.

So the average artist isn’t going to get rich from NFTS. But doesn’t an NFT add more than monetary value? The original artwork is more enriching to the viewer than the print, the firstedition book somehow more magical than the paperback reprint… “I think those analogies don’t quite translate,” Catherine says, “at least for me, because there’s a physical and tangible difference between a print and an original painting, or a reprint. You could argue that NFTS are attempting to set up the provenance that gives originals their value for digital goods, but the experience is the same to the viewer regardless of whether or not you own the NFT.”

SO IT’S A FAD?

“I don’t think it’s a fad, but the market is so volatile – and is clearly already dropping in popularity – that it won’t be as radicalising as NFT supporters believe it will. A lot of people will always want physical versions of an artwork they can hang on their wall and can experience everyday. No amount of giving digital goods inflated value and scarcity will change that!”

Catherine’s Youtube video comprehensively and compellingly lists numerous other ways NFTS are bad, a big one being their effect on the planet, which is a massive concern for Nataˇsa Ilincˇic´.

A RIDICULOUS AMOUNT OF ENERGY

“My aversion towards NFTS stems mainly from their environmental impact,” Natasˇa says, calling NFTS a “conceptually and emotionally empty ticket.”

Technology magazine Wired recently reported on another highprofile NFT auction. French artist Joanie Lemercier – a climate activist – recently put six NFTS up for auction on the Nifty Gateway website. They sold for thousands of dollars in 10

NFTS expend a ridiculous amount of energy to produce ultimately nothing

seconds. The sale consumed 8.7 megawatt-hours of energy, equivalent to two years of energy use in Joanie’s studio, then sold again – another year’s worth of energy.

“The system is similar to the one that verifies Bitcoin,” Gregory Barber wrote in Wired, ”involving a network of computers that use advanced cryptography to decide whether transactions are valid – and in doing so uses energy on the scale of a small country.”

“NFTS,” Nataˇsa says, “expend a ridiculous amount of energy to produce ultimately nothing. Considering the current situation and global warming, I believe that participating in this scheme is deeply unethical.” Nataˇsa’s latest art book,

A Compendium of Witches, is a collection of stories about 29 witches and their various historical settings: “My art explores the spiritual relationship with nature,” she says. “If I were to support practices that are hugely detrimental to our planet, it would render my art meaningless. Art is about communication – if my actions undermine my message, I might as well do something else.”

Joanie said he had no idea how much energy his NFT auction would consumer, and cancelled his next two auctions – priced at $200,000. Not all artists are willing to do the same.

“I’m sad to say that I have lost respect for many members of the art community for this,” Natasˇa says, “not only for disregarding the environmental impact, but also for – this applies to the big names – funnelling younger and/or lesser established artists into this pyramid scheme, ultimately exploiting them.”

“Personally,” Alexandria Neonakis says, “I think they’re a fad… in the time you’ve sent me these questions the whole market seems to have crashed, which is a thing crypto people swear is

A Tarot card of the witch’s garden from Edinburgh-based artist Nataˇsa Ilincˇic´’s recently released A Compendium of Witches Oracle deck. A personal piece by freelance Canadian artist Alexandria Neonakis, who previously worked as a concept artist at Naughty Dog.

Part of a series by US artist Catherine Graffam exploring “the idea of what ‘pink’ means in relation to my gender identity. I feel that it’s impossible to reach the standards society has set for women.”

Hecate is one of 29 witches who appear in A Compendium of Witches, Nataˇsa’s book about witches from all around the world and from historical periods. A study at sunrise of a Californian beach, where Alexandria now lives and works. Alexandria’s piece exploring costume and story possibilities for characters Ellie and Dina from the game The Last of Us Part II.

Hotaru from Nataˇsa’s A Compendium of Witches, which she funded through is Kickstarter campaign and is on sale now.

A new piece by Catherine, whose Youtube channel features tutorials and lectures on issues affecting the industry.

A personal piece by Alexandria, who’s worked on The Last of Us, Left Behind, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End and Uncharted: Lost Legacy. Natasˇa describes A Compendium of Witches Oracle Deck as “a tool for reflection and guidance.”