Holy ‘Grails’ by NFT Art are up for sale and collectors are clamoring for them

The live auction at 4pm on June 15 is expected to realize around $5 million, which will be in addition to the slightly more than $6 million already realized from the collection via auctions and private sales, Sotheby’s said.

Three Arrows Capital, which was based in the British Virgin Islands, filed for bankruptcy in July under Chapter 15 of the US Bankruptcy Code, which is for cases involving more than one country. The former hedge fund’s assets – including the NFTs – are now being liquidated, with proceeds from sales going back to creditors, according to Teneo (BVI), which is handling the liquidation.

Perhaps lucky for the firm’s creditors, digital art is still being collected even if the category as a whole isn’t making the same kind of headlines it once did. In fact, many collectors who were aware of these works coming to market are jumping at the chance to participate, according to Michael Bouhanna, Sotheby’s head of digital art and NFTs.

On May 19, Sotheby’s sold seven works from the Grails collection during its one-day contemporary art auction for a total of US$2.5 million, all achieving results above the upper end of their estimate range.

Among the sales were Hobbs’ Fidenza #725, 2021, which realized US$1.02 million, above a high estimate of US$180,000, and Larva Labs’ Autoglyph #187, which sold for US$571,500, also above a high estimate of US$180,000. The final prices include fees, while the estimates do not.

Sotheby’s also brokered private sales from the collection totaling US$3 million, including Larva Labs’ CryptoPunk #6649, which it described as a “rare alien punk”, and Autoglyph #358.

“What we’ve seen from this initial kickoff of the Grails series is that there’s a lot of interest when it comes to quality, especially around generative art, and long-form generative art,” says Bouhanna.

The Grails collection includes several works of long-form generative art, which refers to projects that can include hundreds or thousands of unique iterations of digital art created by an algorithmic script. As Hobbs describes it in an essay on his website, when a collector purchases a new iteration of a project, “the script is run to generate a new output, and that output is wrapped into an NFT and passed directly to the collector.”

The collection, which hits the market on June 15, features several landmark long-form works, including Cherniak’s Caller #879 (the goose), 2021, which is one of 1000 iterations. The winning bidder will receive the Ethereum-based NFT and a signed and titled printout. The estimate for the work, which is guaranteed to be sold by a third party, is between USD 2 million and USD 3 million.

Another is Snowfros Chromie Squiggle #9071, 2021, one of 10,000 iterations, and the first project done on Art Blocks, which created a platform that enabled long-form generative projects, says Bouhanna. Florida-based Art Blocks says the “Squiggle” was a passion project of Erick Calderon, the company’s founder and CEO.

The interactive animation is estimated to sell for between $8,000 and $12,000, but already has a bid of $14,000, according to Sotheby’s website.

Also for sale is Autoglyph #218, with an estimate range of US$110,000 to US$180,000 (and a current bid of US$100,000). The auction also includes five additional works by Austin-based artist Hobbs’ Fidenza series, including #216, which Sotheby’s describes as an “important example of how the randomized process of generative art can produce results that are perfectly balanced.” The work is expected to fetch as much as US$180,00 and now has a bid of US$110,000.

It’s been a year and a half since the market for NFTs recovered from an initial wave of interest and crazy prices. Today’s market is “much more organic and healthy” and “less speculative,” says Bouhanna.

A wider range of collectors is particularly attracted to generative art, including traditional clients, some of whom had collected initial works of computer-generated art created in the 1960s. In its online catalog, Sotheby’s describes three public exhibitions of graphic art in 1965 that featured works by multiple artists that were generated by a computer algorithm.

It’s “this duality between the artist and the machine that’s really interesting,” says Bouhanna. For decades, artists have adapted to technological innovations with the tools at hand. “The most prominent one we’ve seen is the blockchain – it unlocks a lot of possibilities for the artist, which is why we’re seeing a very strong revival of this movement,” he says.