Digital Artwork Sells for Record-Breaking $6.6M in Ether on Winklevoss-Owned Marketplace
Artwork represented by a non-fungible (NFT) token has sold for a record-breaking sum of $6.6 million in the ether cryptocurrency.
According to a tweet from NFT marketplace Nifty Gateway on Thursday, “history has just been made” with the sky-high sale of the animated artwork created by digital artist Beeple. It depicts what appears to be a monumental Donald Trump lying face down in the grass and covered in graffiti.
The sale was brokered by Nifty’s art buying services, according to the platform, which said the buyer wishes to remain anonymous. Nifty was acquired by the Winklevoss brothers’ cryptocurrency exchange Gemini in 2019.
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The NFT artwork movement has been steadily growing and has seen buyers, who are connected to artists via online marketplaces such as Nifty Gateway, Larva Labs and Open Sea, snatching up digital artworks at increasingly high prices.
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“NFTs are the future, and this is just a glimpse of that … there is no ceiling on what a piece of art can be worth.” Nifty Gateways co-founder Griffin Cock Foster told CoinDesk via email. “Soon the most valuable NFTs will be worth more than any physical artwork.”
Foster said he believed Beeple’s artwork sold for such a substantial amount because it was the artist’s “first-ever 1/1,” meaning the artwork is the only one in existence.
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Mike Winkelmann, aka Beeple, is a graphics designer from Charleston, S. C., who creates a variety of digital art, including short films and videos.
He has also worked on concert visuals for such performers as Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and Eminem, according to his profile on social media platform Behance.
“Beeple is quickly becoming, or arguably already is, the most important crypto artist in the world,” Foster said.
