Dear Bankless Nation,🏴

We, who live in the web3 world, recognize the same artistic dignity in digital art as in physical art, and understand the role and representation of NFTs in events for exhibitions and even museums.

But are we ready to recognize the value of a physical work when represented digitally, or would we we see this as a "copy"? A right-click-save of physical reality, the "JPG" version that feigns to representation of the original?

If so, we can therefore say that we have broken down only a small part of the wall that separates these two forms of art; being able to give physical dignity to digital art without being able to give digital dignity to physical art, which is the same journey in a sense. Many experiments are underway to make physical works of art unique and unambiguous, most of which use proprietary technologies. Decentralized Arts believes that art should not depend on permissioned non-open sourced technology and that any monetization must pass through new innovative tools that remunerate the owners without creating new barriers. This is a journey in understanding value, and thank you for taking it with us.

Welcome to Decentralized Arts.

Contributors: BanklessDAO Writers Guild (Grendel, Kouros, Frank America)

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Uffizi Gallery and NFT

by Grendel

Imagine for a moment all the art preserved in the major museums around the world: The Louvre of Paris, The MoMA of New York, The State Hermitage of Russia, The Tate of London, or Nacional Del Prado of Spain? How useful to this collection of our world’s heritage might the implementation of NFT technology be?  What would happen at the intersection between the collector's impossible desire to own a masterpiece and the potential right to free use of art by everyone?

One of the most important museums in the world, the Uffizi Gallery in Florence has started a new path, giving the collector the opportunity to have a unique digital reproduction of a masterpiece and, at the same time, securing a profit in years made difficult by the pandemic, generating an income that can support the care and display of the many treasures that the museum preserves.

Due to last year's pandemic, museums and art galleries have been forced to close access to their works for several months. The subsequent crisis of the tourism industry has put museums in severe economic difficulty, leading top-tier art institutions to turn to new technologies, such as NFTs, for financial solutions.

The Uffizi Gallery in Florence is therefore transforming some of their best known works into NFTs and attracting the interest of collectors from all over the world in doing so.

It begins in May 2021, with Michelangelo's Doni Tondo (1503-1504) as an NFT version. A digital version of this masterpiece, depicting the Holy Family, was sold for €140,000 /$170,000. Stop for a moment and do some quick maths to consider what this market could become. This is all thanks to a patented cryptographic system that prevents tampering and copying, accompanied by an NFT.

The purchase of the digital work and the related NFT does not imply ownership of the physical work of art itself and does not grant copyright to any other digital image of the art that already exists or may exist in the future. It’s effectively non-exclusive non-fungible digital ownership of our world’s greatest works. The scope of ownership is in fact limited to lines of code and to the image file itself and is authenticated by the digital certificate, supported by blockchain technology. The NFT buyer cannot have any influence on what happens to the painting now, or in the future, and the museum visitor's experience of the physical painting is unchanged. What changes is the profitability of the museum, and what web3 does to all things, adds a market layer on top of sedentary calcified systems like finance, music, and film.

The encrypted file of the painting is associated with only one device at a time (identified through the serial number) and, once paired, the created NFT can no longer be modified. The agreement between the issuer of this patent and the Florentine Galleries provides for the digital version of other works. Among all, we mention Madonna del Granduca, Woman with a Veil, and Madonna del Cardellino by Raffaello; Birth of Venus, Spring, and Calunnia by Botticelli; Annunciation and Baptism of Christ by Leonardo.

Despite the museum's willingness to proceed with an issuer that uses patented and proprietary technology, this does not reflect the ideal version of NFTs, which is an open source and permissionless technology that makes it possible to achieve a real breakthrough in copyright, just remuneration and distribution of useful digital assets. What has been done by the Uffizi Museum however represents an interesting step towards this implementation, especially considering that these are works of art from past eras and of incalculable artistic and historical value.

The point of contact between physical and digital represents one of the main themes in the development of thought linked to metaverses and it is therefore necessary to ponder over these methods of representation - and monetization - of physical works of art in both digital and virtual spaces, from one direction to the other, and back again.

📰 Curated NFT News

Remember AIM? How about EIM? Blockscan Chat Debuts

The team behind Etherscan has released this new messaging platform in beta. Blockscan Chat allows users to send messages to any Ethereum address.

This messaging platform is centralized. However, it brings new opportunities to the space as you will no longer need any other personal information to message people in the metaverse.

On the other hand, scammers will have another way of sending malicious links or forms to anyone. As always, please be extra cautious and do no not share personal information or click on links from unknown sources. To mitigate some of these risks, Blockscan Chat also has a built-in spam feature where users can block suspicious addresses or allow only users that have sent you at least one transaction.

YouTube’s Head of Gaming joins Polygon Studios as CEO

Ryan Wyatt, YouTube’s Head of Gaming will be leading Polygon Studios starting next month. YouTube Gaming has seen an exponential growth under Ryan’s helmet, and it now accounts for billions of gaming watches per year.

Polygon launched Polygon Studios in 2021 to focus on NFTs and gaming in particular, and it has seen a lot of movement in this area, increasing the number of NFT and gaming projects on Polygon. Polygon is also committed to this project and plans to invest big into the studios.

Welcome Ryan to the Web3 space!

Ryan Wyatt (fwiz.eth) @Fwiz

It is bittersweet news to share that I am leaving @YouTube. I have loved every minute of my time here, but it is time for my next endeavor. I am elated to announce that I will be joining @0xPolygon ($MATIC) as their CEO of Polygon Studios. Thank you for the memories! ❤️

January 25th 2022

2,038 Retweets25,822 Likes

BanklessDAO Artist Showcase

🧑‍🎨 Artist: Riker / RIK3R#7109 - Portfolio

Filmmaker, Editor, Economics. Success in Web3 is my goal. I was too young for the Dotcom bubble and the explosion of crypto, but I promised myself I wouldn't miss another opportunity like this. I believe Web3 and the decentralized internet is the future, and I hope that I can influence positive change in the digital world.

bDAO: What does it mean to be an artist in bDAO?

Rik: BanklessDAO is a great platform to hone my skills and find opportunities to create art. I don't think I'm alone in saying I prefer to work for myself, but having the DAO as a space that appreciates and needs art gives me motivation to work.

bDAO: What are your thoughts on the NFT world?

Rik: It reminds me of the wild west. Lots of opportunity, but with people and entities looking to scam and trick, you need to be smart and perceptive to succeed in an unregulated environment. Despite this the chance for success is undeniable. Reputation is also important, and small artists and talented individuals need to take back the initiative on NFT's, or the concept will be tainted by greed.

VIDEO

bDAO: How can DAOs help art and artists?

Rik: The biggest problem is branching DAOs outside of the crypto space. Unfortunately, as a result of the reputation of NFT's, many artists and crypto newbies are rightfully nervous about a new, unproven concept like DAOs. If BanklessDAO can shake the connotations, just the existence of the DAO is enough to influence a paradigm shift in the art world.

VIDEO

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