Mission Statements for Web3 Curation
A variety of Web3 platforms declare how they curate Digital Art on the blockchain
The Curation Mission: Auditing the Digital Art Space
Anyone buying an NFT for their profile pic will think about how well the artwork represents their identity. And the more artwork you buy, the more thought you put into why you want to collect what you collect. Here are the research notes I’m using while reflecting on my personal curatorial thesis.
Let’s take a look at the different ways the following entities declare their mission and/or their curatorial thesis for collecting. Short commentary is included in the bullets below each.
My goal is to clarify what aspects of a curatorial thesis create a storyline that makes a collection relatable and valuable. These are organized by collector type.
DAOs
DAOs are generally a group of like-minded individuals that pool their resources to achieve something that couldn’t be done alone.
Fingerprints DAO
Fingerprints DAO: “The DAO collects art, commissions new works, and supports projects by innovative artists — all of which explore the creative possibilities of blockchain.”
The DAO also has a curatorial thesis that goes into more detail, but in short, they collect digital art they think will hold value because the artworks are “making innovative use of the blockchain for artistic expression.”
Is this a unique curatorial thesis? Maybe. Time will tell how Fingerprints puts its own curatorial thesis to the test for the collection it builds.
Adding some additional narrative about the artists’ project within each of the galleries will help explain how the work displayed fits the curatorial thesis.
PleasrDAO
PleasrDAO: “...to collect digital art that represents and funds important ideas, movements, and causes, that have been memorialized on-chain as NFTs.” And… “PleasrDAO’s thesis is starting to take form. It stands for community, freedom, and decentralization.”
This is a fairly broad thesis, only relying on blockchain to memorialize significance, but their momentum comes from their origin story and how they rally their network to buy pieces of significant history.
Is their thesis unique? The success of a DAO’s curation depends on the community. So the thesis ‘stands for the community’ is a bit too self-referential. It doesn’t sound unique, but their story IS unique, and as long as their story remains cohesive, the DAO’s collection will be too.
Blockster
Blockster: “...publishing stories about the culture and lifestyle of web3.”
This DAO isn’t a group that is collecting art, but stories. They are using blockchain to organize how stories of web3 culture are told, and it makes for a good contrast to the other curatorial DAOs.
Is it unique? For now, it’s novel, possibly self-serving. In the long run, it’s not a mission that distinguishes value.
Social Curation Platforms
These mostly rely on community members to create galleries or exhibitions. But what are their foundational missions and how are they different from one another?
JPG
JPG.space (Juried Protocol Galleries): “A community-sourced contextual data layer for the NFT ecosystem.”
This platform has two methodologies for organizing and displaying artwork, Exhibitions, and Canons. Exhibitions display artwork as configured by platform members. The Canon (there’s only one at the moment) is a group of works that fit into a curatorial thesis. JPGs Dynamic Canon looks like a marketplace in the making, and it’s distinguished from openSea and other gallerists because the JPG community does the work of categorizing an artist’s project. Could there be a Wikipedia vibe here? There isn’t a clearly stated vision and mission for JPG. But there’s a democratic feel and structure developing that will support it for the long run.
Here’s the first “Exhibition” from Future Human Art on JPG.space:
A Future Human Art “exhibition” added to JPG.space JPGs Curatorial Thesis for their first Canon “Dynamic” is great: “NFTs or NFT collections that create a continuously evolving experience by updating their appearance, their metadata, or the blockchain state.”
Is this unique? What’s intriguing here is how the JPG community isn’t collecting per se, they are providing the service of adding desperately needed narrative to the digital art industry. The question is, can this community maintain its exciting culture as it matures? Or will it begin to feel like the traditional art world?
This site follows suit from AOTM and 6529 with over-the-top fonts. Unnecessary, but hey, it’s a thing now.
Deca
Deca.art: “Your place to discover digital objects”
It’s a social gallery site that rewards users for creating galleries and earning followers and likes.
Even though the platform is made for creating galleries - when new members start out they are forced to create a lot of junk galleries and beg for followers and likes so they can collect XP and upgrade their membership NFT.
“Growth at any cost” is their strategy. That sounds horrible and it is. I respect the intelligence that has gone into developing this platform. But their growth strategy feels like a play for “first mover” centralization. I wish it were different, and have hopes that JPG.space won’t follow suit with absurd XP gamification.
The membership hook is the ever-changing membership NFT designed by Kjetil Golid (wow!) There is value here if you want to play Instagram for digital art. But the antics going on for a new member leaves a bad taste and it continuously overshadows any narrative building for long-term value generation.
Gallery
Gallery.so: “Gallery is a limitless social canvas of curation and connection for your digital objects.”
This platform obviously has a smaller team than Deca, but the simplicity of its site is refreshing. One is able to focus more closely on the artwork, and there is hope that they will bring curation and narrative into their own brand identity.
“Limitless Social Canvas of Curation” feels too broad for the mission. Gallery.so will need some constraints to help distinguish it from other platforms.
You can buy a membership NFT (0.08 Eth). I like this. Though networking is important, putting money down for membership feels better than scrounging for followers on discord.
In their funding announcement, the Gallery.so team wrote about how they aren’t happy, “There's no proper place to enjoy the NFTs you love.” … and that Gallery will be… “a place where the meaning, story, and gravity are appreciated.”
I admire the Gallery.so approach, and sincerely wish for their success as they deepen their feature set and fulfill on delivering enjoyment, meaning, and story.
… and looking forward to being able to search more easily!
Club.NFT
ClubNFT: “ClubNFT’s mission is to build the next generation of NFT solutions to help collectors discover, protect, and share their digital assets.”
These guys are building tools and doing integrations for sake of conservation, because - believe it or not - NFTs can disappear from the web.
This doesn’t look like a social platform yet. But their underlying preservation tech is the value prop that should keep the paying members coming (instead of likes and follows.) Nice.
They aren’t curating per se, but these guys are definitely OG and the network they are choosing to work with is an OG community. Following their blog and discovering artists that flow from their recommendations have natural gravitas.
ClubNFT doesn’t have a curatorial thesis other than displaying their preferred artists on their site. Owning a work from their stable of preferred artists gets you membership perks. (It works… it’s not hard to get a collector shopping!)
Since ClubNFT is primarily a tech platform rather than a social one for now, it may need its own category. The technical-innovation-first approach makes me think of Artblocks.io, which blends curation and tech into one. It’s hard to separate.
Independent Curators and Gallerists
In a previous post, I wrote about The Big Three. They are Curated.xyz, 6529.io, and AOTM.gallery. I group these together because they all began by aggressively buying pricey digital art. But Feral File is also part of this grouping, though it stands apart because it began with representing artists.
At the risk of being too repetitive here are a few more notes.
Curated
Curated.xyz: “...collects exceptional crypto art and culture. We draw on cultural significance, aesthetic taste, and technical fluency to guide our curation.”
Though it’s an impressive collection, there isn’t really a strong curatorial thesis here beyond something like… we own l o a d s of the world’s most valuable NFTs….
Works are displayed using Gallery.so without any particular curatorial narrative. You just know it’s dope, enough said. (If you know You can only say ‘wow’ so many times
Are Curated.xyz and other collections like it pushing the boundaries of blockchain art? Not really. They have so many pieces from the same expensive projects it’s more like they are just flexing rather than pushing for a new understanding of what’s possible.
6529
6529.io: “THE 6529 MISSION IS TO ACCELERATE THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN OPEN METAVERSE” ← yes in all caps
Are they accelerating the development of an open metaverse? They keep buying cool art. They are building a lot of VR galleries. And yea, it looks like “Bridge” is some new tech around membership??
Much like Curated.xyz, these guys superflex huge fonts and huger wallets. But they seem more motivated to build a movement than just have a mega-collection. That’s nice to see!
Art of This Millenium
AOTM: “Art of This Millennium is a global gallery and publishing house specializing in contemporary digital art.”
This site feels like a traditional art site (despite the over-the-top web3 fonts), and its commitment to being a leader in the development of digital art is evident.
When AOTM opened it was surprising to see Vince Van Dough launch something so rigorous and polished. His fascination with Rare Pepes doesn’t show through on this more serious venture.
The gallery brand is the thesis. AOTM makes clear the curatorial thesis doesn’t need to be stated, the work speaks for itself. But the effort to develop stories of provenance and institutionalize a web3 movement puts it a step ahead of Curated.xyz.
Feral File
Feral File: “Evolving from the art gallery and publishing models, we are borrowing the best traits of each to inform a new kind of art space. Feral File works in tandem with a community of technologists, new media artists, collectors, and curators to redefine and frame a sustainable model for the future of digital experimentation.”
This is the most thoughtful mission, calling out the needed effort to “...redefine and frame a sustainable model for the future of digital experimentation.”
Their mission is written in audience-specific language for artists, collectors, and enthusiasts.
Artists: Feral File uses “... smart contracts to record each edition, provenance and collect royalties – even for cross-blockchain transactions.”
Collectors: you can safely store your NFTs with Feral File, or custody them yourself.
Enthusiasts/Researchers: Feral File is institutional and committed to preservation and education.
So much effort has gone into making collecting more accessible for non-crypto-native collectors, the extra hurdle of collecting on Bitmark is a surprise for crypto-native collectors! (no you cannot use Metamask!)
Despite the Metamask anomaly, the Feral File team has amazing technical acumen and experience, paired with a compassionate worldview. They have the most well-rounded approach to advancing digital art in modern times. (Though JPG could have the most modern approach.)
Final Thoughts
There’s more to add and better organization of these mission statements is possible. I’m especially grateful to Fingerprints DAO for the education. And to Dr Tina Rivers Ryan and Regina Harsanyi for inspiring me with their professional curatorial edge in the NFT space.
THANK YOU for following along!
Stay tuned for the Curatorial Thesis for Future Human Art.
Great post! It's really interesting to see the various approaches to curation in the digital art space. I particularly appreciate the analysis of the different curatorial theses and how they contribute to the value and cohesiveness of each collection.
It's clear that a strong and clearly defined mission is crucial for any entity curating in this space.
I also agree that adding narrative to explain the context and significance of each piece of artwork is important for creating a more immersive and engaging experience for viewers.
Thanks for sharing these insights!