Breaking a Banksy into 10,000 (Digital) Pieces


In the latest example of art market disruption, a prominent former auctioneer met with cryptocurrency experts in May to purchase the 2005 Banksy painting.love is in the air“$12.9 million and now plans to sell 10,000 pieces NFTs, or immutable tokens.

Management, Loic GouzerWhile at Christie’s, it upset the traditional auction format – most notably, arranging its $450.3 million sale. Leonardo da Vinci In 2017, painting at the contemporary art auction helped found Particle, a platform that combines art and technology to reach a wider pool of potential buyers.

“As a kid and looking at auctions and catalogues, I felt it was impossible to participate financially and was, by definition, excluded,” Gouzer said in a phone interview. “Separating work at 10,000 NFT allows for a much broader audience to be part of a collectibles experience.

“Of course you can enjoy art when you go to the museum, but enjoying art also comes with owning it,” he continued. “That’s why people collect.”

If successful, the initiative could help fuel a burgeoning category of competition in the art market, with consortia of multiple buyers challenging the supremacy of billionaire collectors at a time when the pandemic is accelerating online commerce. NFTs have become increasingly popular, accounting for one-third of online sales, or two percent of the overall art market. by database Artprice.

Earlier this month, thousands of cryptocurrency fans – ConstitutionDAO – They pooled their money to bid for an original edition of the Constitution at Sotheby’s (raising about $40 million, losing to collector and hedge fund magnate Kenneth C. Griffin, who paid $43.2 million). Last March, digital artist Beeple (aka Mike Winkelmann) sold his NFT “Everydays: The First 5,000 Days”. $69 million at Christie’s online auction.

Long-term collectors stay Skeptical about NFTs and art experts say the Particle initiative is the latest iteration of an as-yet-unproven virtual art world. “A work of art is a unique object, and art-loving collectors would love to own the object itself,” said Megan Fox Kelly, president of the Professional Art Consultants Association. “NFT is a separate entity from the object. “I think we’re still in the very early days to understand how these NFTs exist as works of art,” Kelly said. “They look like investment vehicles with potentially very significant returns right now, and the conversations around them have focused on that.”

The physical Banksy painting “Love Is In The Air,” featuring the image of a bomber throwing a bouquet of flowers, will be on display from December 3. Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, during the Art Basel week.

Banksy was split into a 100 x 100 grid, resulting in 10,000 unique squares, or Particles that would sell as NFTs for about $1,500 each. Each particle represents a minority ownership of the painting and comes with a collector’s card showing the entire piece of art as well as the piece’s position on the painting.

Gouzer said he had experience selling the artist last April. Urs Fischer’s first NFT – a unique digital token encrypted with the artist’s signature and individually identified on a blockchain – approximately $98,000 auction app Fair Warning encouraged him to explore similar sales. “I realized that a lot of people are interested in art, but there is no way to be a part of it,” Gouzer said.

a former president Post-war and contemporary art at Christie’sGouzer started his new venture with ethos.io co-founders Shingo Lavine and Adam Lavine and recently rebranded Voyager, which connects financial institutions to the blockchain. Other co-founders are Philip Eytan, co-founder and president of Voyager, and Oscar Salazar, founding chief technology officer and chief architect of Uber.

Particle has raised $15 million in seed funding, and Gouzer says they will raise more to expand their inventory. The group was emboldened by the latest example of ConstitutionDAO raising the cryptocurrency Ether for its losing bid. (By the way to the threshold, the group is now trying to return the money to backers and is facing high transaction fees.)

“This showed that people want to be a part of something bigger,” Shingo Lavine said. “There is a tremendous appetite for exploiting masterpieces of fine art and expensive relics.”

The founders said they were also responding to the widespread desire for ownership. “There’s a difference between the person who has this image and downloads it, and the person who owns it and says, ‘It’s me,'” Shingo said, adding to the NFT receivers, “People are accepting this new narrative of owning things.”

But legal questions of piracy and fraud in the NFT market have not been tested in court, which poses an element of risk. It is also unclear whether other countries will recognize the validity of an NFT sale. “These marketplaces are much more complicated from a legal perspective, as you have third parties with their own contracts and currency issues,” said Diana Wierbicki, partner at Withersworldwide and head of global arts law.

The company founded the Particle Foundation, a non-profit organization that will preserve purchased artworks and tour for exhibitions. One percent of what is purchased will be donated to the Foundation, which will supposedly act as a protective piece and ensure that not a single person can claim to own the physical painting. “The business can never be resold,” said Gouzer.

Interested buyers can apply from 13 December and sign up for the waiting list in the meantime. particlecollection.com. The sale of Banksy units begins the week of January 10 and will be held on the Avalanche blockchain platform. The Particle company says it will try to ensure that units are distributed among different buyers, rather than multiple purchases by an individual buyer.

“We don’t sell you the image of the painting,” said Harold Eytan, CEO of Particle. “We are selling you the concept of ownership of a piece of the painting where some are buying shares. This is a different collecting experience.”

As for Banksy’s work, Gouzer said the rebellious spirit of the painting was an apt metaphor for what Particle was trying to do—defying the status quo.

“It’s a piece of revolution,” Gouzer said. “We’re not trying to change the world here, but we’re trying to reach a new community and compete with some of the world’s greatest collectors.”



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