{"id":4185,"date":"2021-05-26T14:10:55","date_gmt":"2021-05-26T21:10:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/juliafriedman.org\/?p=4185"},"modified":"2021-09-03T13:36:28","modified_gmt":"2021-09-03T20:36:28","slug":"on-crypto-art-and-the-aura","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/juliafriedman.org\/?p=4185","title":{"rendered":"On Crypto Art and the Aura"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Another co-authored article on NFTs\u2014<a href=\"https:\/\/athenaeumreview.org\/essay\/nfts-the-afterlife-of-the-aura\/?fbclid=IwAR2lHUq_XtUfPc6Q3z-I7EIngtspdPxNArxNMP3d7fvOvdRvsjDT_sdOYVg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&#8220;The Afterlife of the Aura&#8221;<\/a> out on the Atheneum Review website. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"400\" height=\"230\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/C4wm-p_VFh0\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap\">The \u201caura\u201d is what makes the experience of viewing Da Vinci\u2019s Mona Lisa in the Louvre, or his drawings at the Met, different from looking at their images in a book. It is inseparable from the viewer\u2019s visceral reaction to the physical traits of the work: variable pressure of the crayon on paper, the thickness of impasto brushstrokes or their glossy translucency, the weave of the canvas showing through the loosely applied imprimatura, the mutable effects of light playing on the surface at different times of day. An artwork\u2019s aura is also the source of its financial value, the reason the original Mona Lisa is worth more than a reproduction. But if the original is destroyed, there is nowhere physical for the aura to reside. The aura\u2019s abstract, symbolic nature is then revealed, and it becomes possible to package, market and sell the aura in the absence of the original. The destruction of the original allows the NFT to monetize the aura, imposing on it the form of financial value. As Daystrom explain:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Value has become increasingly fungible, diluted and unstable in our evolving metaverse and there\u2019s a tremendous spike in user demand for exclusivity. NFT assets provide this exclusivity and create an entirely new online value system that was previously unimaginable.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But an \u201caura\u201d is not a material thing. Does it necessarily perish along with its physical incarnation? Perhaps it was not destroyed so much as transubstantiated, reborn into a financialized afterlife where it is no longer subject to mortal decay. Like BurntBanksy, Daystrom make a plea for authenticity, not a protest against it. But authenticity is no longer a quality of the original artwork, contingent on the artist\u2019s touch or painterly gesture. Authenticity is now a quality of the NFT that represents the original, and the only authenticity available today is statistical uniqueness. Yet people remain sentimentally attached to the old distinctions between authenticity and image, original and reproduction, reality and representation. The cries of fear and loathing at the prospect of destroying a Basquiat drawing (albeit not a great one) or a Banksy print (albeit one of an edition of 500) are not na\u00efve defenses of the artwork\u2019s lost integrity. They are inarticulate but nonetheless passionate protests against the postmodern condition. No wonder the word \u201cdeconstruction\u201d where simple \u201cdestruction\u201d would have sufficed was so triggering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read the entire article <a href=\"https:\/\/athenaeumreview.org\/essay\/nfts-the-afterlife-of-the-aura\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">HERE<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another co-authored article on NFTs\u2014&#8220;The Afterlife of the Aura&#8221; out on the Atheneum Review website. The \u201caura\u201d is what makes the experience of viewing Da Vinci\u2019s Mona Lisa in the Louvre, or his drawings at the Met, different from looking at their images in a book. It is inseparable from the viewer\u2019s visceral reaction to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1060,1],"tags":[225,829,785,1035,1031,1046,1045],"class_list":["post-4185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nft","category-uncategorized","tag-art-history","tag-art-market","tag-basquait","tag-crypto-art","tag-nft","tag-postmodernism","tag-rauschenberg"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>On Crypto Art and the Aura - Julia Friedman<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/juliafriedman.org\/?p=4185\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Crypto Art and the Aura - Julia Friedman\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Another co-authored article on NFTs\u2014&#8220;The Afterlife of the Aura&#8221; out on the Atheneum Review website. 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