Should museums become involved with NFTs?
The digital art world has been buzzing with NFT chatter. Following the record-breaking sale of Everydays at auction last winter, digital artists, crypto entrepreneurs, and digitally-minded museums have hastened to respond to the potentially seismic shift brought on by the burgeoning trade in digital artworks in the form of non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Since then, many artists have hoped to emulate their success, while organizations as diverse as the NBA, the British Museum, and traditional investors have attempted to present NFTs for Muesums as a revolution – not just in how digital art is corporatized, bartered, and retained, but also in how social items are compiled and devoured in an increasingly digital world.
Cryptocurrency holders have discovered an alternate emphasis for their long-term investing strategy since 2013, but mostly in the last two years due to standardization and technological advances in the digital creative economy. Their assets, which have occasionally multiplied in value by 1,000 times when converted to fiat currencies, are now being used to fund artists, creatives, and metaverse real estate: the “long term” that this culture values.
Despite a generational split and a lack of a shared vocabulary, “holding” shares many characteristics with the conventional attitude of museums and collectors. Inspired by pandemics, art-market speculation, unethical dealings, popular apathy, and even civic upheaval, institutions protect cultural assets. And, in general, museums reject requests for decisions even in the darkest of times, thinking that the long-term significance of their collections for humanity outweighs any short-term advantage.
Whether we like it or not, the artifacts and opinions treasured by the public often shape history. Museums will likely have to deal with NFTs for museums in some fashion, even if only as donations. Because of their huge collections of art, culture, pop, and design, some people believe museums are sitting on a golden trove of ‘NFT-able’ digital assets.
If these institutions do not explicitly describe their internal attitude toward digital assets, viewers may mistakenly believe they are selling a high-priced counterpart of a low-value collector keepsake, or even a fractional share in the actual piece. So, what is the long-term benefit for holders of these tokens? Simply marketing authorization and selling JPEGs is not a good way for museums to get involved with this technology. Instead, they’d need to develop an authentic voice and business strategy – as well as comprehend the deft balancing act of visibility, time stamping, FOMO (fear of missing out), community, and inventiveness that propels this new wave of innovation.
