Cryptopunk

While completing the final version of this assignment, I was able to have a lot of fun with editing the details of my Cryptopunk by using my 24x24 pixel rough draft and uploading to a 100x100 pixel blank canvas. While this was actually an accident at first, I enjoyed the initial effect it created and was then able to further edit my character and add more details that I could not include before. One quote from the Cryptopunk article that was published to Christies website stood out to me says, “The core of the idea was that every character should be unique,” which is actually an original quote from Larva Labs, the creators of the Cryptopunks in 2017. Going off this, I decided to make my character as original as possible, and yet still make features that could capture my own personal identity in some ways. To start, in the updated version I added more layers and depth to the already pink and blonde hair that I had given my character. The reason for this two-toned hair is to capture two sides of my identity, hypothetically. I have previously highly considered dying my hair pink, just for the fun of it, as I feel it could accurately represent the creative side of me who loves to play with bright colors and create art out of everyday object, in this case my hair. However, I still remain a blonde-haired girl as I feel it also represents me in other ways, such as my family roots and, as far as the stereotype goes, the playful and clumsy ‘dumb blonde’ that I can occasionally embody from time to time.
In another video that I watched while attempting to further understand this topic, the physical aspect, or lack thereof, in NFT’s is discussed in depth. An art specialist from Christies named Noah Davis says, “It’s really a radical gesture to offer for sale something without any object… and we might as well lean into that.” To move onto a second aspect of my final character, I have added some more detail to the hat on my head, in a further attempt to represent the crochet nature of it. In Beeple’s NFT that sold for almost $70 million dollars, I find his use of a physical object to accompany the piece very interesting. This way of creating and selling NFT’s was also used in the exhibit by Molly Soda called Pieces of Me, an online gallery of NFT’s to be actioned off this month. Just as Mike Winkelmann provides a physical token of his piece “Everydays - The First 5000 Days” for the buyer, and Molly Soda gives out a candle with her work, I had a similar idea if I were to hypothetically offer this Cryptopunk as an NFT for sale. Crocheting has been a hobby of mine for almost a year, and I have been working hard to sell pieces like this hat to my friends and peers, mostly for fun but also for the income. An idea I had when creating this cryptopunk was to include this crochet piece and hypothetically offer it for sale along with the purchase of my NFT. This technique is one the I could even use with other pieces of crochet as a way of selling my work while taking advantage of the new world of NFTs.

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