Ethereal Summit Art Auction Disappoints in Year Two
May 17, 2019
The blockchain art auction at the Ethereal Summit on May 11, 2019 was, to say the least, disappointing — especially compared to last year’s auction. The turnout was dismal, the enthusiasm for blockchain art low. The wealth that had been circulating among ETH holders last year has evaporated, so the possibility of art buying, along with the significance of “blockchain art,” has diminished.
At last year’s auction, a CryptoKitty sold for $140,000. None of the pieces this year broke four figures. You could almost hear the crickets when a video piece by Jessica Angel, titled Fiat Is Doomed, sold for $300 — hundreds less than the starting price. Wired, Vice, and The New York Times covered the Ethereal art auction in 2018. A crypto industry rag touched on it briefly this year.
The only real success story lay in the sale of a CryptoPunk, a unique, Ethereum-based image created by Matt Hall and John Watkinson of Larva Labs several months before the advent of CryptoKitties in 2017. In 2018, a CryptoPunk was the first piece to sell at the auction, for $950. This year, it went for $7,000 (check out the video below). Even in crypto winter (spring?), some “blockchain art” pieces have more staying power than others.
