05/07/2021 NFTs find credibility among Indians as crypto fever continues

On the NFT marketplace by WazirX, India's biggest cryptocurrency exchange in terms of trading volume, a unique NFT, which was a collaborative artwork between pop icon Ritviz and visual artist Santanu Hazarika, was sold for $391.8 within 10 seconds of going live. WazirX has sold more than 160 pieces of digital art on its platform for NFTs within month of its launch.

New Delhi: As high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) continue to invest in cryptocurrencies and seek to diversify their portfolio, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are slowly gaining asset-class credibility. 

Indians are also warming up to this new digital asset that has given creators and collaborators a fresh platform to earn better moolah while generating more value for their work. 

NFTs allow people to buy and sell ownership of unique digital items in cryptocurrencies, and keep track of who owns them using the Blockchain. NFTs can technically contain anything digital, including drawings, artworks, tweets, animated GIFs, songs or even video games. 

TV host and actor Vishal Malhotra collaborated with artist Ishita Banerjee to release an NFT which was sold last week for 2.5 Ethereum ($5,500) -- five times the listed price. 

On the NFT marketplace by WazirX, India's biggest cryptocurrency exchange in terms of trading volume, a unique NFT, which was a collaborative artwork between pop icon Ritviz and visual artist Santanu Hazarika, was sold for $391.8 within 10 seconds of going live. 

WazirX has sold more than 160 pieces of digital art on its platform for NFTs within month of its launch. 

The crypto company on June 1 rolled out South Asia's first NFT Marketplace with 15 creators hailing from diverse categories such as space 3D artists, digital artists, muralist photographers, canvas artists, street artists and visual artists. 

The platform came without any listing price and extended 50,000 WRX (WazirX tokens) as bonuses for the community. 

"More artists and collectors across the globe are today tapping the power of NFTs. NFTs ensure the exclusivity of ownership and can be seen as a way to digitise artwork and other collectible items," said Sandesh B Suvarna, VP, WazirX NFT Marketplace. 

According to Hazarika, the global NFT market is slowly becoming a crucial promotional tool for all artists to monetise their work and uniquely engage with their community of collectors and fans who value art. 

"With NFTs, artists are now open to working with anyone," he said. 

The WazirX NFT Marketplace is powered by the Binance Smart Chain, which brings the gas fee -- a sum required to mint the NFT via a blockchain -- down from $60-$100 to about $1. 

Since the NFTs are interoperable, anyone can later transfer the NFT to a different cryptocurrency such as Ethereum. 

An exhibition featuring the artworks of Bengal-born artist, Lalu Prasad Shaw, certified using NFTs is on view at Terrain.art till July 31. 

"Terrain.art is delighted to be one of the first blockchain powered platforms in India to register artworks using NFTs, presenting new works and those with prior histories through curated exhibitions," said its founder Aparajita Jain. 

On the global stage, digital artist Michael Winkelmann or Beeple sold one of his NFT arts for nearly $70 million earlier this year. 

An NFT artwork by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was sold for more than $5.4 million in April. 

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey even sold his first tweet as an NFT for over $2.9 million.

According to Capgemini's World Wealth Report (WWR), with the current stock market surge, HNWIs are seeking to diversify their portfolio with alternative investments. 

"Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) are becoming more popular, while non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are slowly gaining asset-class credibility," the report noted.

Arts

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/cryptocurrency/nfts-find-credibility-among-indians-as-crypto-fever-continues/articleshow/84113433.cms

Interesting NFTs
G0 SER GOLD STUD 98%
Yo! I'm G0 SER GOLD STUD 98%. I'm a Culinary Sanitation Specialist by day, and I like swiping left by night. I'm convinced that that one day cats will rule this planet. One day I'll prove it. Let's pawty!
Michael Jordan - Crown Collection
“All you needed was one little match to start that whole fire.”- Michael Jordan. In regards to both the action on the court and everything that happened off of it, Jordan provided a spark that changed the future in so many different ways throughout his tenure in Chicago, and even decades after the fact. And, in the end, he got everything that he wanted when he began his NBA journey: he turned the team and organization as a whole into a respected program, like the dynasties he looked up to as a child. Having steered the Chicago Bulls to an incredible six championship rings in eight years from 1991-1998, scooping up five MVP awards in the process, Jordan is one of just a handful of superstars who have truly transcended their sports. Jordan and Scottie Pippen’s (right) relationship both on and off the pitch was arguably the foundation of the Bulls’ incredible success. Scottie Pippen was present with Jordan for all six championships in eight seasons. Dennis Rodman (left) His relentless and smart play perfectly suited what Jordan and Jackson wanted to do to take the Bulls to greater heights. Although his exploits off the court earned him special fame, Rodman was unquestionably one of the greatest basketball players of his generation and one of the finest defensive players in the history of the game.
#49405
By OthersideDeployer
Alex in Wonderland
A figure, Alex, stands mostly naked in the midst of a physical and psychological maelstrom. He is clad only in nostalgic 80’s era socks, on a tenuous island between active waters and a variety of shark denizens. Sharks on the right side of the image are all beached, including a shark with a quartz crystal snout, an orange shark wrapped in a life buoy, and a shark further in the distance wearing an 80’s style shirt with the number “88”. On the left side is the largest shark, wearing bright glossy red lipstick and brandishing prominent teeth with braces. She is cordoned off from the figure by a roped float divider, and within her thought bubble is a warning symbol. Behind the figure, hovering in the air, are Grey aliens emerging from the distance, out of a series of elliptical UFO shaped interdimensional membranes. The Greys take on the visual form of spermazoa ostensibly impregnating the interdimensional thresholds. As is typical, these Greys inhabit a zone just behind the unconscious topology of Alex’s dissociative mind. Though Alex’s bottom half is representative, his top half mutates into a psychological cornucopia. In a manner akin to “Auto-Erotic Sphinx”, a predecessor work, the figure has self suctioned—an act of sensual infatuation, enjoyment, and exploration. Upward exists the figure’s primary conscious eye, adorned with a revolutionary beret emblazoned with a Bitcoin badge. The figure’s summit features the nose of a fighter jet facing off against video game Bullet Bills, one of whom is marked by a communist North Korean star. A cropped section of a UFO observes the contest. Alex’s mind branches both left and right. To the left is more singular embodied consciousness, manifesting two eyes and a Ganesh trunk grasping crayons. The right branch dissociates upward diagonally, emerging into an array of eyes, faces, teeth, tail, a unicorn horn, and much more—all of which participate in expressing his unconscious being; a democracy of psychic factions representing thought impressions and associations. All illumination and darkness– fernal, infernal, high consciousness and corporeal underbelly–reside in this realm. In the distance are relatively languid, light clouds, and against the firmament hovers a colossal distant eye peering over the scene and far beyond. This painting possesses underlying genetic traits with previous works such as “Auto-Erotic Sphinx with Toys”, “Dionysus”, and “Fuku-Shiva”. The work serves also as a nod to an earlier period of art inspiration during late teens and early twenties— born out of the nakedness, vulnerability, curiosity, and wonder inherent to coming of age and all subsequent psychedelic revelation.
Genesis
JosĂ© Delbo sent me his striking pencil sketch and powerful inked work, which I then interpreted in oil on canvas. I wanted to create a very painterly piece with obvious brush marks etc, but I was also aiming for a nostalgic feel, a kind of 1980’s superhero comic book look, the kind I grew up with. My goal with this animation was to try to recreate, in part, the creative process that both artists went through with the visual information I had. I was able to showcase my painting process more accurately as I could take photographs of my progress throughout. Consecutive images could then be layered like brush strokes over José’s drawing to create the impression that this was one continuous artwork from pencil, to ink, to completed painting. The representation of the line sketch at the beginning, then pencil/ink and lastly the paint layers being applied demonstrate both artists’ struggle for the right lines, tone, form, and colour until the work is finally completed. As the oil was still wet with each photograph the glare of my studio lights can be seen in the brush strokes. Eventually, the figure emerges and as it does, our hero comes to life, looking directly at the viewer -- but is he grimacing in approval or disgust? We will never know for sure as just before he can say anything, white paint is brushed across the canvas entirely and the process begins again. Only the bat is quick enough to escape.