This weekend, a new museum in Seattle will open its doors. A physical space dedicated to digital art, the Seattle NFT Museum will showcase work by leading creators, as well as hosting events and Q&A sessions featuring NFT artists, and live mintings.
The opening weekend, 14 – 15 January 2022, sees a featured artist event taking place, looking at the work of Blake Kathryn. There will also be an H+ Creative artist showcase. The opening collections include Cryptopunks, Tyler Hobbs and Snowfro and also feature Seattle artists Robbie Trevino, Charles Peterson and Neon Saltwater.
Seeing digital art live in person
Seattle NFT Museum is founded by entrepreneurs Jennifer Wong and Peter Hamilton. Speaking to The Seattle Times, Hamilton says:
“We started to visit our first NFT galleries a few months ago and started to see the dramatic effect it can have to see digital art live in person in full scale in a physical space and how that makes you think about the art and experience it in different ways.
“We believe that there was an opportunity to create a physical space that can show the breadth of art and technology that is being developed and that can explore new domains and categories and show the general public really how expansive this medium can be.”
“We felt like the aspect that was missing was just the education, learning and context for what we were looking at,” added Wong. “I think we love the experience of being able to see physical art together with friends and to be able to talk about it like you would with any shared experience.
“But without being a deep NFT expert, we didn’t really understand the true value of what we were looking at. And that’s why for us we wanted to really focus on more of the museum aspect versus just a gallery so that we can focus on bringing context to the art pieces versus just having someone walk in with the expected knowledge of already understanding what they’re looking at to potentially buy it.”
NFTs are not a new concept but are a growing trend for the attractions industry. Last year, Russia’s State Hermitage Museum announced that it was trading digital art on Binance NFT and The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in LA said it was fundraising by selling Pillar Award NFTs. Meanwhile, The Crypt, a new museum dedicated to NFT art, launched online.
Image: The Seattle NFT Museum
