This piece of digital art just sold for $645,000.
Actually it was bought for 420 ETH, which makes it even more expensive today.
This art piece (known as a “Hashmask”) is not physical, was not printed, painted, nor sculpted. It can be downloaded, copied & pasted infinite times. Right click, Save As and you have the same image and artwork that the owner paid so much money for.
But you won’t own the original, and we can verify that.
This piece of digital art and many others like it are backed up by NFT’s (Non Fungible Tokens) that contain specific information that makes it distinct and verifiable on it’s native blockchain. The owner purchases and owns the digital token and the art is attached.
Not yet sold on digital art? Well this also highlights a use case for physical art. How do we verify it? Copies can be created easily, so how do we verify that the original painting from the original artist is the one hanging on your wall?
As blockchain seeps into every industry, this use case is also relevant for other products. Projects such as VeChain & Origin Trail are focused on supply chain and verifying the steps taken throughout. Projects such as Wabi are focused on consumer products, verifying safety of ingredients put into our products and consumables.
NFT’s and the digital art market is growing rapidly. As more people become aware of it’s existence and get more comfortable with the concept of digital art, this also raises questions about how we value art? If you think Bitcoin has no intrinsic value, then try to justify the price of a Jackson Pollock painting (between $100M to $200M). Is it a case of education? Perception? Or like everything, is it just a case of supply and demand?
The emergence of blockchain solutions are causing us to challenge many deeply rooted assumptions.
Kendrick Lemar asked “How much a dollar cost?”
As the dollar gets printed into oblivion and the bill for the COVID pandemic is still totting up, the blockchain economy and decentralised finance is emerging. The world is left sitting at home asking…
“How much shutting down the economy really cost?
“How much a Bitcoin really cost?”
“How much a $GME really cost?”
“How much my house really cost?”
“How much a funky looking Hashmask jpeg really cost?”
“How much a dollar really cost”?
