ART PARTY: Creating and Transferring Tokenized Donations of Art using Blockchain Technology
Using OpenLaw, a tokenized donation of art by Jennifer and Kevin McCoy was generated and transferred using a template to certify the donation.
Art and blockchains are on a collision course. At a fundamental level, blockchains bring property rights into the digital realm, providing artists with the tools to distribute high value and scarce works of art in the digital realm.
Here at OpenLaw, we’re leading the exploration of this transformation. Several months ago we showed you how art could be modernized with blockchains, demonstrating how artists could tokenize and log a piece of work, create a license around it, and program real-time royalty payments — opening the doors for widespread fractionalization of art ownership.
Recently, we’ve partnered with renowned multimedia artists Jennifer and Kevin McCoy and the Whitney Museum in New York City to expand the opportunities for 50 applicants to become a “donor” via OpenLaw powered smart contracts in a way that have not previously been possible on the blockchain.
For this project, the artists donated original artwork, a 16mm film, to the Whitney Museum’s Special Collection on behalf of members of the public titled “Public Key/Private Key.” As described by the artists “Public Key/Private Key” complicates the traditional relationship between museum, benefactor, and audience.
Starting in May 2019, members of the public can submit an essay to the artists to become one of fifty “Donors.” Once a Donor is selected, the artists will then transfer and record one of the unique Donor Certificates on the Ethereum blockchain via an OpenLaw powered smart contract. Each of these 50 Donor Certificates is recorded on the Ethereum blockchain as a cryptographic ERC-721 Non-Fungible Token (or “NFT”). An NFT on the Ethereum blockchain is a way of representing any unique asset such as a work of art or other intellectual property like “Public Key/Private Key.” Each of the 50 Donor Certificates/NFTs comes with a unique and immutable ID number and message chosen by the artists. By layering a traditional legal agreement on a smart contract, OpenLaw can give full force and effect to the intended terms of the NFT.
A Donor is then free to transfer, gift, or even sell their “Donor” title to another Donor. The changing list of donors will be tracked for six months on the Ethereum blockchain and can be viewed at [URL]. By transferring these tamper-proof Donor Certificates/NFTs via the blockchain, it is easy to publicly track provenance and ownership.
Additionally, there is an Easter egg hidden in “Public Key / Private Key.” The film also has a blockchain key embedded in it. As part of an exhibition at the Whitney Museum, the first audience member to take note of and submit the key to the artists will become the fifty-first donor of record.
About OpenLaw, OpenLaw is a blockchain-based protocol for the creation and execution of legal agreements. Using OpenLaw, lawyers can more efficiently engage in transactional work and digitally sign and store legal agreements in a highly secure manner, all while leveraging next-generation blockchain-based smart contracts. To learn more about OpenLaw, check out our site and documentation for an overview and detailed reference guide and. You can also find us at hello@openlaw.io or tune in in our community Slack channel. Follow our Medium and Twitter for further announcements, tutorials, and helpful tips over the upcoming weeks and months.
About Jennifer and Kevin McCoy, Jennifer and Kevin McCoy’s multimedia artworks examine the genres and conventions of filmmaking, memory, and language. They are well-known for constructing subjective databases of narrative material and making fragmentary miniature film sets with lights, video cameras, and moving sculptural elements to create live cinematic events.
The McCoys’ work has been widely exhibited in the U.S. and internationally at venues including the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; BFI (British Film Institute), London; Hannover Kunstverein; the Beall Center, Irvine, CA; pkm Gallery, Beijing; the San Jose Museum of Art; Palazzo della Papesse, Siena; the Addison Museum of American Art, Andover, MA; the Sundance Film Festival, and Artists Space, New York. Their work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Milwaukee Art Museum; the 21C Museum; and the Speed Museum, Louisville, KY. They received a Creative Capital Award in 2003, the Wired Rave Award for Art in 2005, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2011, and a Headlands Alumni Award in 2014.
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