...And After Abstract is Only BTC Digital Art.. :D :D :D
...Bloomberg -
Investing in art is a rite of passage for financial heavyweights, marking their transformation from unrefined market players to modern aristocrats.
Billions of dollars made playing stocks and bonds are funneled into a Jasper Johns painting on the wall, Picassos in a bunker at the Geneva Free Port or, famously in the case of Steve Cohen, a 14-foot tiger shark preserved in formaldehyde by Damien Hirst at the center of a penthouse living room.
With Bitcoin surging more than 400% over the last year and trading near all-time highs, it’s the crypto-millionaires’ turn to dabble in the finer things. Sales of digital art have skyrocketed from $235,000 in Feb. 2020 to $63 million this month, according to data from Cryptoart.io, which tracks sales across six auction houses. What’s new in this instance is the art, like the currencies, has no physical presence.
The core case for buying digital rather than physical art is that it comes with a publicly verifiable record -- a non-fungible token, or NFT -- that ascribes ownership and authenticates a work through public blockchains. In exchange for opting for something you can only see on a screen rather than hang on a wall, the buyer never has to worry about the issue of provenance. The question of authenticity has bedeviled even the most venerable of real-world art dealers: Manhattan’s Knoedler Gallery went out of business in 2011 after being sued for selling millions worth of sham paintings made by a forgery ring based in Queens.
And while the chain of custody is guaranteed, there’s no such promise that what’s on offer will suit the typical art buyer’s tastes. Much of what occupies online galleries reflects the sensibilities of crypto enthusiasts: memes, jokes and coins. Bitcoin, Ether and the Ethereum blockchain’s creator Vitalik Buterin are favored, if not trite, muses.
