Part 2.
Two days ago my artist friend called to talk about their dealer and preparations for their upcoming 'show', which was it turns out a virtual show, a sort of webinar. Problematic as that might be, for an artist whose constructions often have to be behind ropes, not to protect them from the viewers, but rather the other way 'round, he did have some assets apropos to the show. Still, virtual presentation requires a fair bit of filmography to be good, and this was the main topic of worry.
In the course of worrying about what works he had video of, and the efficacy of said videos, he says 'oh, and they want me to issue an NFT, because Chrisites is closing the auction on a million dollar one the day after our show, and we want to offer one in the show'.
What to mint? How to mint it? Who will mint it? What would it mean to own it?
'Oh. And the show is in 4 days..'
Now keep in mind, my artist friend's works exist in a sort of fractal explosion; to discuss one of them with him can/will result in long forking discursions into events, objects, mental state, social state leading up to or resulting from the creation. It is annoying and fascinating at the same time.
What to mint?
So: Is there a digital asset? Yes: we had time left in the recording studio [link to why they have the studio {sub-link to the history of the contact person}],[link to who the sound guy was],[link to what they were on] after shooting the set (MOMA says this work was a pre-cursor to modern music videos!), and we recorded two whole new songs right there. And then, at much expense (at the time), my friends transferred that to digital.
How to mint it?
I had never heard of NFT art up to this point, but had some ideas about how to do it. My notion was to embed the hash of the digital artwork in block chain transactions, to produce a digital provenance of the artwork. The hash of some digital art from a FaceBook friend from way back got put on a testnet transaction and tested. I was ready to go! All I had to do was get my friend to accept a bit of bitcoin (I was kinda stingy, I think I was proposing 0.05 BTC or something ) and I could seal the hash on the real blockchain.
Ha! Like pulling teeth. Sad, that would be $2500 now, eh? But the deal was not to be. And there were complications with the scheme. I could not figure how, with BTC op-codes, to enforce the transfer of that OP_RETURN hash value to a new buyer. Not to mention needing the consensus view of reality that would convey the value of being able to prove one owned the hash as being equivalent to owning the digital artwork.
But from that history, I felt my friend's digital asset would need to be digitally signed, and a hash made of it. How to convey this concept to an artist who becomes.. flustered .. at most anything digital. But eventually, I think, at least the concept of having the digital file on hand was established.
Not exactly an NFT
As I learn more about what a NFT is, I think my notion of crypto-provenance is not exactly the same thing, though it has a lot of the same characteristics. I think , as old school creatives, we eschew the abstract value of ownership.
