“A Contemporary Artists View On The Metaverse, and Everything in Between”
by Rodshir Dailë
This year there has been a huge explosion in the NFT, and Metaverse space. As time moves forward we are starting to see these spaces expand and become more incorporated in business practices. Highly reputable figures in the contemporary art space such as Sotheby’s and König Galerie have all built spaces within the Metaverse. Currently, digital real-estate on these platforms are selling in six-figure numbers. This past summer a number of large digital real-estate transactions made headlines, such as Boson Protocol, who purchased a plot of digital land for approximately $704,000USD in value. On June 18, the New York-based digital real estate firm Republic Realm acquired a digital estate on Decentraland for a record-breaking 1.3 MANA ($913,800USD).
But as we now find ourselves in the early stages of Web3, and other advancements within the blockchain, it already has raised conversations of concerns. What are they? The pros and cons. One could give a vast list of the positives and negatives. As this once niche space has scaled tremendously over the past couple of months, perhaps one of the most important aspects are the concerns over copyright and trademarks. How will other artists, creators, designers and artists’ estates protect their original works?
Traditionally the ownership of a copyright provides exclusive rights to the owner under 17 USC § 106 — the right to reproduce the work, prepare derivative works, distribute copies, to display the work publicly, and to perform the work publicly. So with the creation of an NFT, it generally can be categorized as a copy or even a derivative of the original work (“a work based upon one or more preexisting works” such as an “art reproduction…or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted.”).17 USC § 101. In comparison to what is entailed under U.S. copyright law, the copyright holder is and should be the only one with the authority to transform the original work into an NFT. The examples given above covered US copyright laws solely, and only gives small insight into the complex world of copyrights, being that every country has their own copyright structures.
One of the biggest attractions of crypto-based platforms and web3 is the freedom of decentralization. Decentralization has its plus sides, but however this is one of the downsides for the individuals that are creators and copyright owners. Since majority of NFT platforms are unregulated, this adds additional work for artists, and copyright owners to then constabulary search NFT platforms for infringed works. Being that this is a fast moving market, and infringed work can be listed and sold before the copyright owner could even contact the platform or take any form of legal action. It is known that in most cases, the platforms offers original artists the possibility to claim resale royalties. Many would argue that the original artist should be entitled to all royalties, profits and compensation for damages of infringed works. But is this enough?
This is one of a handful of negatives within the NFT space, in my opinion factoring in the many people who are self-proclaimed artists, with no background in art or art history knowledge. Many of them have profited from the sale of NFT’s, either by creating something random flippantly on the fly or rip-offs of other artists’ works. Being an artist myself, I am all too familiar with what the life of a full time artist entails. The hours, days and years spent sending proposals, applying to open calls, grants, networking with collectors, advisors, gallerists, and simply just trying to sell a piece of art. Then someone with no background can bypass this process entirely and sell a NFT for thousands, and in rare cases millions. This is not disrespect to the ones that have benefited from this approach, but how long or how will this reflect in the market later down the line?
Fundamentally there will be many changes in the near future for NFT’s, currently you can find new platforms and established platforms offering no gas fee transactions to mint works. I have read forums and other sources where artists have paid huge gas fees to mint a work, only for that work to be placed amongst thousands of other artist listings. This in my opinion is a plus and negative, some sales consist of a work being randomly stumbled upon and the other is simply that the bigger name artists have strong reach across social platforms. It is no secret that bigger name artists benefit from perks, such as placements, benefits that are not available to smaller emerging artists, yet they pay the same amount in fees as larger named artists. Although this is a complicated perspective. I say complicated because on one hand if some sort of tier was put into place, it would then cause a division or categorization between commercially successful artists and smaller and/or emerging artists. But we can all agree that this categorization already exists in the contemporary art market and has existed for quite sometime now. Somehow it would be great to see changes in this area that allows artists, no matter their commercial level, to be able to use the tools available in regard to having a fair shake as an artist.
There are platforms such as Verisart, which was ahead of the NFT trend, and has been offering artists the option to create a Blockchain registered certificate of authenticity. Verisart now offers NFT minting directly through their platform, with terrific options such as collector rewards, multiple wallets, option to list on OpenSea, and custom contracts. They also are a part of the Fair trade art initiative and have a Shopify app integration. With more companies to emerge in the near future offering a similar business model, artists might move away from major NFT marketplaces and sell directly from their own websites.
Although the internet is one big market place, will this current NFT cycle play a huge role in the success rates of forthcoming and emerging artists, who have no representation or connections to the institutional giants that are currently on the Metaverse? In comparison, the process in how artwork is valued in the physical form is still yet to be transparent. This specific aspect has many questioning if this way of pricing will maneuver its way over into the digital space.
In closing, seemingly overnight we entered an “Decentralized Renaissance”. Numerous factors, such as privacy invasion and the start of the pandemic last year, could be credited for kicking this movement into hyperdrive. The pandemic particularly forced many institutions into the digital space to remain relevant and to keep the doors open. I myself was not much of a fan of the older versions of online exhibitions and online viewing rooms. But then AR/VR and walk-through features completely transformed the idea of contemporary arts being exhibited online. We’d adopted this protocol at Daile Galerie, and the response was incredible. It also fueled my curiosity of what direction the art market could potentially go, and now a year later the metaverse has become more dominant. I would have to say I am both excited and yet concerned about this decentralized renaissance. My concerns stems particularly from copyrights and trademark protection for us artists and copyright owners. On the positive side Web3 and the metaverse will give creators more reach globally, which can be beneficial in cutting out a lot of the middlemen, allowing the artist to make a more substantial profit from their works.
In retrospect, if we summarized Web 2.0, it would simply be a complex monopolistic-driven platform built on open protocols selling products to consumers, and imposing on individual privacy in the process. Nevertheless, Web3 shows many positive upsides such as not having people as the product, and giving internet users a greater share of personal sovereignty and decentralized, and privacy-preserving protocols.
Over the past few years and currently, I consult privately for museums and galleries in the space of digital assets. In my practice I have identified many voids that need to be filled, thus offering opportunities to individuals working in similar industries already. Particularly the creation and deployment of smart contracts to be more customizable, and additional options in royalty splits, and accessible legal advisors in NFT assets. I could see blue chip type investments becoming more prevalent in the future of the NFT market and art crypto-based tokens.
These are just some observations I have made over the past couple of months, in no way was this article written to offend, or discredit any companies or platforms within this marketplace. It was intended to get other artists and creatives to ascertain this new space, and start the necessary conversations early on to correct some things that could be crippling to us artists, and or marketplaces further down the line.
