Today, more and more artists prefer to sell their works digitally. The art world has introduced NFTs, or non-fungible tokens as a new way to make the artwork digitally unique. 2021 has marked a spike in digital art sales. Even conventional auction houses, like Sotheby’s and Christie’s, involve in high-profile NFT art sales.
Here are some NFT top artists and crypto art projects in 2021:
1. XCOPY
XCOPY is a London-based digital artist who explores the themes of death, dystopia, and apathy. XCOPY’s artworks present distorted visual loops and some sort of flashing light pattern. XCopy’s highest recorded sale was Some A**hole at $5,119,491.00. This work portrays a skull-like character wearing a jumper and hoodie. His eyes are rolling in the socket, making a perfect image of a nightmare.
XCOPY. Watch the video at https://www.instagram.com/p/COi9i_9JRhl/
2. FEWOCiOUS
The 18-year-old pop surrealist digital artist draws the NFT’s and crypto art’s attention. FEWOCiOUS has sold a total of 3,189 NFT pieces, averaging $8,426.94 each. His highest-recorded sale was a life-size sculpture entitled Nice to Meet You, I’m Mr. MiSUNDERSTOOD. In this work, the artist explores the themes of freedom, isolation, and exploration. It depicts a sobbing character with colorful clothes on his body. This piece represents an intense fear of change and at the same time desperation for it.
FEWOCiOUS, Nice to meet you, I’m Mr. MiSUNDERSTOOD. https://www.sothebys.com/
3. Blake Kathryn
Blake Kathryn is a LA-Based artist who describes herself as a “3D artist with surreal, futuristic aesthetics”. Her works depict feminine and robotic characters, as well as dream spaces. The calm color of her works is so soothing. The artist also portrays the women characters as tough, natural, and futuristic creatures.
Blake Kathryn. Watch the video at https://www.instagram.com/p/CV8KAiKJ9h5/
4. Mad Dog Jones
Mad Dog Jones is a Canadian-born artist. He is combining music and art. Mad Dog Jones has sold 1,590 NFT artworks, averaging $11,634.50 a piece.
“Replicator” depicts a worked photocopier machine in an office room, located somewhere in a big city. This piece sold for $4,144,000,00 on April 23, 2021.
Mad Dog Jones. Watch the video at https://www.instagram.com/p/CUNe92ZFs1A/
4. CryptoPunks
Created by Larva Labs, which was started by two Canadian coders Matt Hall and John Watkinson. This project consists of 10.000 unique characters. Most of them look like punk guys and girls, but some are apes, zombies, and aliens. Each punk is a 24 by a 24-pixel avatar that is generated algorithmically, none of them are exactly alike. The total value of all CryptoPunk sales is currently 594.2k ETH ($1.69 billion).
CryptoPunks. by Larva Labs. https://www.larvalabs.com/cryptopunks
5. BORED APE YACHT CLUB (BAYC)
BAYC is a collection of 10,000 Bored Ape NFTs—unique digital collectibles living on the Ethereum blockchain. Each Bored Ape character is unique and programmatically generated from over 170 possible traits, including expression, headwear, clothing, and more. The buyer of BAYC avatar will gain membership access to a club whose benefits and offerings will increase over time. A special-edition ape with gold fur was recently sold at auction for a record-breaking $3.4 million.
BORED APE YACHT CLUB (BAYC). https://boredapeyachtclub.com/#/home
6. Beeple
Mike Winklemann—who goes by the artist name Beeple, has sold his piece at a record-breaking $69 million. His work entitled EVERYDAYS: THE FIRST 5000 DAYS (2007–20) is a large JPEG consisting of 5,000 individual JPEGs. Beeple called this piece, “every single day for 13-and-a-half years”. In this work, he depicts surreal, comical, critical, futuristic, and sometimes grotesque pictures.
Beeple. EVERYDAYS: THE FIRST 5000 DAYS (2007–20). https://mymodernmet.com/
The growing interest in cryptocurrencies and blockchains bring NFT arts and Crypto art projects as promising digital assets in the future. NFTs also looks like the most prominent and most criticized visuals in the future of the “metaverse”.