The Los Angeles County Museum of Art has just announced a major donation<\/a>, courtesy of one Cozomo de\u2019 Medici<\/a>, an anonymous NFT collector. The museum touts the gift of 22 digital artworks by 13 international artists, almost half of whom are women, as the first donation of a collection of NFTs to a U.S. museum.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a good step to bridge the worlds of digital art and contemporary art,\u201d Cozomo de\u2019 Medici told Artnet News on a Zoom call with the video off. \u201cI firmly believe that they both can benefit from each other.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere are other donors who have seeded different parts of the museum, with gifts of ceramics, tapestries, Asian art, Islamic art\u2014all these these great collections at LACMA have begun with with single large donations,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said, referring to figures like William Randolph Hearst<\/a>, the greatest individual donor in the institution\u2019s history. \u201cThe big hope here is that a well-rounded seed collection of digital art will inspire other collectors to to follow.\u201d<\/p>\n LACMA\u2019s board has also approved the acquisition of 15 other artworks on the blockchain\u2014including an NFT of John Gerrard<\/a>\u2019s Western Flag<\/em><\/a> and a piece from Tom Sachs<\/a>\u2019s \u201cRocket Factory<\/a>\u201d collectible series, both donated by the artists\u2014which brings its budding NFT collection to 37 works.<\/p>\n Dmitri Cherniak, Ringers #962<\/em> (2021). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, promised gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection, \u00a9Dmitri Cherniak, courtesy of the artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The Cozomo de\u2019 Medici donation includes work by Justin Aversano<\/a>, Cai Guo-Qiang<\/a>, Dmitri Cherniak<\/a>, Claire Silver<\/a>, Neil Strauss<\/a>, Monica Rizzolli<\/a>, Matt DesLauriers<\/a>, Adam Swaab<\/a>, and Pindar Van Arman<\/a>, as well as by creators of some of the best known NFT collections: Han<\/a> (CryptoCubes<\/a>), Matt Hall and John Watkinson (CryptoPunks<\/a>), Johannes Gees<\/a> and Kelian Maissen<\/a> (Kleee<\/a>), and Yam Karkai<\/a> (World of Women<\/a>).<\/p>\n It\u2019s a wide range of work, from Silver\u2019s portraits generated by artificial technology to Aversano\u2019s photography to Neil Strauss\u2019s Survive All Apocalypses<\/em><\/a>, the first book minted on the blockchain. There\u2019s also Karkai\u2019s Woman n\u00b0001<\/em>, the artist\u2019s first-ever NFT, from her 10-piece collection \u201cWomen by Yam<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n The pseudonymous collector offered few details about his personal life or background, other than saying that he has invested in cryptocurrency for about 10 years.<\/p>\n Yam Karkai, Woman n\u00b0001<\/em> (2021). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, promised gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection, \u00a9Yam Karkai, courtesy of the artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n It was clear, however, that de\u2019 Medici is not, in fact, Snoop Dogg<\/a>, as the rapper claimed in a highly publicized tweet in September 2021. It was just a month after de\u2019 Medici started his Twitter account, quickly establishing himself as a major force for NFTs, with a wallet then said to be worth $17 million.<\/p>\n (Today, de\u2019 Medici owns 1,124 NFTs on OpenSea<\/a>, but declined to estimate the collection\u2019s worth, noting that price aggregators don\u2019t accurately take into account the rarity or aesthetics of a work.)<\/p>\n Snoop\u2019s supposed self-doxxing seemed plausible at first. The rapper and NFT collector has been involved with cryptocurrency since at least 2013, when he accepted bitcoin as payment for an album he released at the time.<\/p>\n But de\u2019 Medici had previously shared a photo of himself, face obscured, that suggests he is white. As reported by Slate<\/a>, it would seem that Snoop\u2019s tweet was part of a promotional stunt for his metaverse project on the Sandbox. (Vice<\/a> described the breathless media coverage of the fake reveal as \u201cbeing CryptoPunk\u2019d.\u201d)<\/p>\n A photo NFT influencer Cozomo de\u2019 Medici tweeted of himself with singer Jason Derulo.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n De\u2019 Medici declined to offer any real specifics about his life or background, deeming such details \u201cirrelevant.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve always been an art lover, but I was always intimidated by the contemporary art world,\u201d de\u2019 Medici admitted. \u201cYou have probably heard the phrase \u2018if you don\u2019t know who the sucker is at the poker table, it\u2019s probably you.\u2019 That\u2019s how I would feel when I went to contemporary art fairs.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe beauty of this digital world is everything is on chain and online. You can go and see the mint dates, and the provenance is all recorded. You can see other works from the artists you are interested in, who owns them, where they\u2019ve been, and the prices\u2014versus the contemporary art world, where it\u2019s really tough to get access to that data as an outsider,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n De\u2019 Medici hopes the accessibility of NFTs will encourage more people to become collectors, and that that will in turn increase the number of artists who can make a living from their work.<\/p>\n Matt DesLauriers, Meridian #547<\/em> (2021). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n LACMA has yet to announce plans to display its new NFT holdings, which will require specialized screens (one barrier to entry for first-time collectors).<\/p>\n \u201cThere are some great companies that are that are building some cool frames, but they\u2019re very expensive right now\u2014running from $10,000 at the smallest, to $40,000 for slightly larger displays, which is just too much for mainstream adoption,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said.<\/p>\n The sky-high prices of NFTs in 2021 had de\u2019 Medici worried that the tokens would cause the crypto bubble to burst. But then a close friend who shared his skepticism bought a CryptoPunk.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said \u2018you know how bullish I am on ethereum, and I see CryptoPunks as a digital token of ethereum culture,\u2019\u201d de\u2019 Medici recalled. By the end of the conversation, he was ready to start a collection of his own.<\/p>\n Matt Hall and John Watkinson, CryptoPunk #3831<\/em> (2017). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, promised gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The Cozomo de\u2019 Medici pseudonym came from his first purchase, CryptoPunk 3831<\/em><\/a>. A Zombie wearing a face mask, who is known as \u201cCozom,\u201d short for \u201cCOVID Zombie,\u201d and is among the works donated to LACMA. (De\u2019 Medici briefly listed Cozom for sale in December 2021 with an asking price of 697,000 ETH, then worth $27.6 million.) Eight of the other works in the collection are now held in the wallet Anonymous0000001<\/a> on OpenSea, having been transferred by de\u2019 Medici in December.<\/p>\n \u201cI wanted to create a presence that recalled the art patrons of the past, and who was a greater patron than Cosimo de\u2019 Medici? And it happened that Cozom and Cosimo had a similar spelling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The Crypto whale\u2019s LACMA announcement comes the day after the opening of \u201cCoded: Art Enters the Computer Age, 1952\u20131982<\/a>,\u201d an exhibition at the museum about the rise of computer technology and the origins of digital art.<\/p>\n Monica Rizzolli, Fragments of an Infinite Field #923, Summer<\/em> (2021). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, promised gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection. \u00a9Monica Rizzolli, courtesy of the artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The gift follows LACMA\u2019s creation<\/a> last June of an acquisition fund for digital art by female artists<\/a>, a project spearheaded by reality TV star and heiress-turned-NFT evangelist Paris Hilton. Indeed, it was actually Hilton who got the ball rolling on de\u2019 Medici\u2019s gift, by introducing the collector to museum director Michael Govan and vice president of board relations Elizabeth Wiatt.<\/p>\n From there, de\u2019 Medici began talking seriously with Celia Yang Nelson, the museum\u2019s principal gift officer, and assistant contemporary curator Dhyandra Lawson about what works in his collection might be a good fit for LACMA\u2014such as work by Van Arman, who the museum was unfamiliar with.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a really beautiful mutual education process,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said. \u201cI turned them on to Pindar\u2019s work and how he had been creating these these paintings with machines and robots for many years. It\u2019s some of the earliest unchain art made with artificial intelligence.\u201d<\/p>\n Pindar Van Arman, AI Imagined Portrait Painted by a Robot #2<\/em> (2018). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, promised gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection, \u00a9Pindar Van Arman, courtesy of the artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The news of de\u2019 Medici\u2019s gift comes just days after the Centre Pompidou<\/a> announced its first NFT acquisitions<\/a>, including a CryptoPunk donated<\/a> by Yuga Labs. The company launched its Punks Legacy Project in 2022 by gifting CryptoPunk #305<\/em> to the Institute of Contemporary Art Miami<\/a> ahead of Miami Art Week.<\/p>\n The ICA was the first major museum to acquire an NFT, with another Cryptopunk donation coming from a board member in July 2021. Other museums are slowly following suit, with SFMoMA<\/a> announcing last month that it had acquired a Lynn Hershman Leeson NFT, as reported by the Art Newspaper<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n In New York City, the\u00a0Museum of Modern Art<\/a> is currently hosting<\/a>\u00a0a\u00a0generative A.I. art installation<\/a>\u00a0by NFT star\u00a0Refik Anadol<\/a>, and will put the proceeds of last fall\u2019s William S. Paley auction<\/a> toward an endowment for its digital offerings\u2014which could include acquiring work on the blockchain.<\/p>\n Some museums have also begun minting NFTs of their own, based on existing artworks in their collections. Among them are the Uffizi Galleries<\/a>, the Belvedere Museum<\/a>, the British Museum<\/a>, and Russia\u2019s State Hermitage Museum<\/a>\u2014a practice that has<\/a> proved controversial<\/a>.<\/p>\n The institutional leader in the space, however, appears to be the Buffalo AKG Art Museum<\/a> (formerly the Albright-Knox Art Gallery), which in October became the first major U.S. museum to stage a show of NFT art<\/a> with an online exhibition of new works donated by the artists. It \u201chas the world\u2019s largest collection of artists who engage blockchains,\u201d according to a tweet from its Modern and contemporary art curator Tina Rivers Ryan<\/a>.<\/p>\n Justin Aversano, Twin Flames #64. Este & Lucja Hetman-Smith<\/em> (2018). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection, \u00a9Justin Aversano, courtesy of the artist.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n For de\u2019 Medici, LACMA was a natural fit for his collection. \u201cIt\u2019s a museum that has always championed art and technology, and is on the forefront of artistic innovation. What Michael has done to adopt the art that that really pushes the cannon is very impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n As with any new technology, integrating NFTs in the collection has presented new challenges to the museum.<\/p>\n \u201cWe formed an internal team of experts in conservation, registration, collections management, technology, information systems, general counsel, and curatorial to devise procedures,\u201d Lawson told Artnet News in an email.<\/p>\n \u201cPreserving blockchain art presents similar concerns to video work preservation,\u201d she added. \u201cThe works\u2019 native technology will change over time. We send artists extensive questionnaires and meet with them to capture their preferences for how their work should be migrated.\u201d<\/p>\n And with LACMA in the midst of a massive expansion project<\/a> that could ultimately cost as much as $900 million, \u201cthere will hopefully be lots of lots of great ways to display digital artworks in these new galleries,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said.<\/p>\n Claire Silver, a feeling i can\u2019t put my finger on<\/em> (2021). Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of the Cozomo de\u2019 Medici Collection.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The LACMA acquisition may be evidence that despite the so-called \u201ccrypto winter,\u201d there is still strong artistic energy fueling the creation of new art on the blockchain.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m more bullish than ever about the space,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said. \u201cThis is a new renaissance that we\u2019re experiencing\u2014you can do anything on the digital canvas, which I call the infinite canvas.\u201d<\/p>\n The downturn \u201cactually has been a blessing,\u201d he added. \u201cIt removed a lot of the speculators. One of the beautiful things to see as the markets went down was that the conversations became richer\u2014because they became even more about the art and less about the money.\u201d<\/p>\n He also believes that the quality of NFT art is converting speculative investors into genuine collectors, with NFT profile pictures, or PFPs, like CryptoPunks or the Bored Ape Yacht Club, serving as something of a gateway drug to more challenging projects.<\/p>\n Once someone makes the leap from a speculator into a connoisseur,\u201d de\u2019 Medici said, \u201cthey\u2019re hooked, and they keep on collecting art.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCoded: Art Enters the Computer Age, 1952\u20131982\u201d is on view at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, California, February 12\u2013July 2, 2023.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n More Trending Stories:<\/b><\/p>\n The Sagrada Familia Will Finally Be Completed in 2026. The Last Challenge? 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<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2021\/09\/E-9R94sUcAI6FsO-1024x1024.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Matt](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/Matt-DesLauriers-Meridian-547-576x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Matt](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/3831-1024x955.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Monica](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/449230scr_e89028d8492a579.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Pindar](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/pindar-828x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Justin](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/justin-aversano-1024x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Claire](\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/app\/news-upload\/2023\/02\/claire-silver.jpg\")
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