Back in the “REAL WORLD,” (do any of you remember when that was still a thing?), my wife and I used to love to go to street fairs, Saturday markets, little storefront galleries, comic conventions, and other merry locales and buy LITTLE art from people. We’d buy postcards, art prints, handmade Halloween and Christmas decorations, zines, ashcan comics, records and CDs from punk and indie bands, buttons and pins, sometimes even smaller original drawings or paintings, if they weren’t too expensive. We loved supporting folks who made things, the rougher and more home-made looking, the better.
In a slightly different, but related, vein, my wife and I ALSO play this weird little game on our phones, Topp’s Disney Collects, which is a digital trading card simulator. Each day they release a handful of exclusive “trading cards,” (really, they’re just images), and the player is allotted so many “coins” each day to spend. You can get MORE coins by completing tasks and watching videos and such, but after the time limit has expired, the cards are considered “SOLD OUT,” and you can’t get them by spending coins anymore… There is something about the LIMITED nature of the individual cards---and the fact that once they’re gone, they’re GONE (at which point you can only get them if you can find someone who is willing to TRADE for them, but the ball is in their court as to how much you’re going to have to give up for them to be willing to trade with you…)
So, wouldn’t it be as cool as HADES if there was some way to take our love of ART and supporting folks who make these cool, creative little works and COMBINE THAT WITH this digital collectible, limited time before the object is gone, hardcore FOMA---Fear of Missing ART---(as Queen Alien, @juliakponsford puts it) game play element??? Guess what!! There is a way…
WELCOME TO NFTSHOWROOM.COM
Built using some sorcery that I don’t understand from the powerful spiritual forces of HIVE and the enigmatic HIVE-ENGINE, the NFT Showroom allows artists to MINT provably scarce, undeniably collectible, independently produced artwork (NO CORPORATE COOKIE-CUTTER SHIT HERE!!!!), for a RIDICULOUSLY low price of only FIVE HIVE per NFT (plus ONE HIVE for each additional edition beyond the first. In other words, make a piece that is an edition of ONE, only FIVE HIVE. Make an NFT with an edition of FIVE, that would be NINE HIVE, (five for the original mint, plus four more PRINTINGS of the original work.)) I’m not a numbers guy, but that seems extremely reasonable to me---especially if you’ve ever tried paying GAS FEES to have stuff minted on a site like Rarible, which is AWESOME, but right now…a bit spendy…
Personally, I’ve already become a serious collector on NFT Showroom, having bought works by @stellabelle and @aggroed and @clayboyn and @rondon and @elgeko !!!
I’m like an NFT SHOWROOM GALLERY OWNER already (and the site only soft-launched today! Still in ALPHA testing!!!)
It’s pretty damn cool and FUN! Scooping up all the GOOD STUFF while the rest of the world is still waking up!
If you’ve looked at any of my previous posts, you’ll know that I consider myself an ARTISTE, as well as a writer… Okay, so I’m more of an ART-PRANKSTER than a MASTER, but there is a place in this world for toilets and soup cans and scribbles and skronk. (And if I know ANYTHING, it’s how to SKRONK with my art.)
Here are a few of the things I’ve minted on NFT Showroom so far:
“Dude with Hat”
“No Free Lunch!”
“Justification”
(This one already sold…)
“Flag”
(This one is already sold, too… Sorry!)
…and then there’s THIS:
“Entry Level NFT”
This one needs some ‘splainin’, so I wrote this in the notes for the piece:
Are you an art collector yet? YES or NO
If YES: ---You are sophisticated and can appreciate the ironic commentary of this limited edition piece. You will buy it to show how clever you are! (It will UNDOUBTEDLY go up in value... Remember Cryptopunks? They couldn't GIVE those things away, and now...just TRY to get your hands on one!!! Better safe than sorry!) Not financial advice, just a cynical joke. We think you should buy one of these because it's funny...and so we don't destroy you!
If NO: ---You probably don't think you can afford to be an art collector, but guess what! YOU CAN!!!! For only about $1.25 USD (give or take 50 cents) you can collect one of these extremely rare (only 13 in the world) works of crypto art, and be on the CUTTING EDGE of the NFT ART GLACIER as it carves its way through society!!! Doesn't that sound nice? Plus, you get to know that your purchase is directly contributing to the creation of MORE fun, humorous, weird, mental health supporting artwork! It's really a win-win-win. (The third winner will be announced at a future date!)
Like I wrote in the notes, I minted an edition of 13 of these, and that’s all there will ever be! I’m keeping one for myself, and I put the other 12 on sale for 5 HIVE each. (As I said above, that’s about $1.25, give or take 50 cents.) Last I checked, three had already sold… I released them TODAY. (See where I’m going with this???) If, by the time you read this, the pieces have already sold out, then you’ll have to wait and buy them on the SECONDARY market, which means a collector will have to be willing to part with them (such a beautiful piece---I’m sure it will be tough) and THEY get to set the price. HERE’S THE COOL THING, though, if you are an artist, and someone buys your art and then turns around and sells it again later, the original artist GETS A CUT!!! (I think it’s 5 percent, and HIVE-ENGINE, I believe, takes 5 percent, but that’s REALLY good, first because most of the time ARTISTS DON’T GET A PENNY FOR SECONDARY SALES!!!! And, second, paying 5 percent to the “house” is also fantastic. When I used to sell my artwork in a gallery in Olympia, Washington, if a painting sold for $200.00 the gallery took HALF! HALF!!! And they didn’t even help PAINT IT!!!)
Anyway, I’m super excited about all of this, and I hope you’ll take the time to check out the site and maybe drop some coins to help some struggling artists feel like they’re work is WORTH something. They’ll feel good, you’ll get a cool, cutting-edge collectible, and who knows? Maybe a few years down the line the prices for digital art will go up! (Not financial advice. In fact I think it’s almost SINFUL---and not in the GOOD WAY---to buy artwork for SPECULATION PURPOSES. FUCK OFF with that shit! Buy art that you like, support artists whose efforts you believe are admirable, and goddammit APPLY FOR THE WHITELIST and make your OWN DAMN ART! If it’s cheap, trashy, punk, scribbly stuff---but with heart and/or attitude---or if it makes me laugh, then I’ll undoubtedly buy it and your work will go into my ever growing NFT Showroom Gallery! So freakin' excited...
---Richard F. Yates
(Primitive Thoughtician and Holy Fool)
SUPPORT INDEPENDENT FOLKS WHO ARE JUST MAKING STUFF BECAUSE THEY LOVE IT!!!
@richardfyates
https://noncom.art.blog/reviews-books-movies-music/
https://makersplace.com/store/richardyates/
https://primitiveentertainment.wordpress.com/