The 888 Inner Artist Initiative: September 2022 Update
Last month, we publicly announced the 888 Inner Artist Initiative. A lot has happened since then.
As a reminder, the 888 Inner Artist Initiative is not just a single program. Rather, it is a comprehensive and ever-increasing set of efforts and endeavors designed to celebrate, empower and support artists. Our goal is to meet the various needs of artists, in a wide variety of ways, wherever they may be on their artistic journey. What we’ve launched so far is only the beginning of our own journey to accomplish this objective.
Weekly Celebration of Emerging Artists
We previously pledged to spend up to 1 ETH a week to purchase art from emerging artists. We have done so, and we will continue to do so.
Here are the pieces that we have purchased so far. Please note that the images shown below are static images, while some of the actual pieces have dynamic video elements.
Week 1
Week 2
Dragon of Colorful Dreams by L2-Universe
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
All of these pieces were not just purchased but also raffled off to one of our Inner 8 members. This has created value for not only the artists but also for members of our community.
Aside from the purchased pieces shown above, our weekly event has also provided a public platform for many artists to have their work shared with a wider audience. As a reminder, our weekly event is not meant to be a contest. Rather, it is a celebration of art. In that spirit, our weekly event has provided an opportunity for new and emerging artists to be showcased and discovered.
The Inner Artist Channels
One of our goals was to organically build a special community of artists, one artist at a time. To date, we have manually verified over 50 artists and given them a special “Verified Inner Artist” role in our server. Any artist whose work is bought during our weekly event automatically receives the Verified Inner Artist role once they join our Discord server. For artists that we have purchased art from who have not yet received their role, we encourage you to join our server and tag a member of the IAI Team; we will give you the role immediately. If you are an artist and would like to be considered for verification, please join our server and complete the following application form. No token purchase is necessary.
In addition to building a solid foundation of verified artists, we have created a number of Inner Artist Channels to serve our artists. First, we have an artist-gated “verified artist chat” that is designed to be a safe space for our artists to communicate, collaborate, encourage each other, and learn from each other. We also have a “community gallery” channel that allows our artists to share their work with the larger 888 Inner Circle community. Anyone on our server can browse the beautiful art created by our artists. If you would like to see more art from both the above artists and the rest of our Verified Inner Artists, please visit our Discord.
We have also created an “artist spotlight” channel, where we have been conducting informal AMAs with special guests and some of the artists from whom we purchase art. Some of the coolest things to happen in this channel are the interactions between an artist whose work we purchase and the community member that receives that art. For example, one of our Inner 8 members was so excited by the art they received that they proudly displayed it on a wide screen television in their home office and shared a picture of it with the artist. The artist and owner of the art had a great conversation. They are now connected outside of our Server and have a continuing relationship that goes beyond our weekly event.
The Next Phase
Phase 1 of the 888 Inner Artist Initiative is now complete.
In the spirit of under-promising and over-delivering, details of phase 2 will not be given at this time. However, our plans include strategic partnerships, metaverse exploration, content creation, opportunity creation for artists and the development of deeper ties between our Verified Inner Artists and the greater 888 Inner Circle community.
The Inner Artist Initiative has gotten off to a great start, and we are just getting started!
For more information, please join our Discord server, follow our Twitter, and view our Medium. Also, as a reminder, if you are an artist, we encourage you to apply to become a Verified Inner Artist.
