The Covid-19 hit artists hard. The artist from Huntington Beach, California saw his entire money-making enterprise suffer, as art exhibitions got canceled, sales slowed and his commissions dried up.
The digital art world was where Rackam pivoted.
The most money Rackam had made by selling a piece of his own art was $11k for a painting and sculpture piece he sold in 2015. After Rackam started creating digital art as NFTs, that changed quickly.
He decided it could be a fun and lucrative project after seeing the success of popular NFT art collections.
I realized I could start doing crazy things with it.
When he reached out to a popular meme page on the social media site, he asked if they wanted to collaborate on an NFT collection. They agreed and Rackam created thousands of variations of a cartoon bull.
The duo sold the entire collection of 10,000 NFTs in 32 minutes after the launch of the meme page and the art.
In the first five minutes, about 2,250 of them were gone. I thought we were going to sell this thing out very hard.
At the time it was sold, the collection was worth more than $2 million, but as of Friday it was worth less than $1 million. The cut that day was $738,593.97.
He celebrated by drinking champagne and playing music.
I started screaming. I lit a cigar in the house and opened a bottle of champagne.
The neighbors probably thought it was some kind of rager, but it was just one artist transitioning to a new medium.
There are other artists who have found success selling NFTs. The sales of digital assets hit $18.6 billion at the end of the year, ruffling some feathers among critics who are concerned about the disruption of the traditional art world.
Many market researchers warn that the NFT market has already become oversaturated, with the combination of massive hype and speculation driving prices to extreme and unsustainable highs.
Our weekly newsletter can help you get smarter about your money and career.
It is still a small part of the market, firm says.
I had $10 in my bank account and I made $109,000 selling NFTs.
Since 2016 Paris has invested in cryptocurrencies and is betting big on them.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
