Sotheby’s pauses the NFT auction citing imbalance in representation

by James · March 27, 2023

Fine art and luxury auction house, Sotheby’s, paused its “Natively Digital: Glitch-ism” NFT auction following a controversy caused by the imbalance in representation, specifically the exclusion of female identifying artists in the NFT auction.

Sotheby’s is pausing Natively Digital: Glitch-ism to correct the imbalance of representation in the sale, and will relaunch with a fairer and more diverse group of artists at a later date.
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— Sotheby’s Metaverse (@Sothebysverse) March 26, 2023

Sotheby’s announced the hiatus in response to glitch artist Patrick Amadon withdrawing from the event.

Patrick Amadon tweeted “I am withdrawing my work from the Sothebys sale. While I think it was a genuine oversight and the team means well, the lack of representation is a serious issue and we need to address this in our space. Female-identifying artists have played a huge role in the glitch movement.”

Sotheby’s New York recently announced Natively Digital: Glitch-ism featuring artwork from 21 glitch artists such as Xcopy, JakNFT, jakethedegen, Luis Ponce, neurocolor, Patrick Amadon, etc.

The online auction opened for bidding on Sothebys.com at 2pm on March 24, but the withdrawal of Patrick and the uproar from the excluded artists led Sotheby’s to finally take action.

“We remain committed to working closely with the community to ensure that sales are artist-driven and represent the breadth of digital artists. We appreciate the community for raising this concern and to the artists in sales, thank you for supporting this decision, tweeted Sotheby’s.

In addition, the auction house announced that it will conduct a panel discussion and exhibition at Sotheby’s New York during NFT NYC to support underrepresented communities of Glitch artists active in the NFT sector.

This is not the first time in history that women-identifying and other communities have been excluded from their respective sectors. The deletion and lack of representation of the glitch artists who have been central to the movement’s popularity is definitely a black mark on such a well-known auction house.

Although Sotheby’s has chosen to postpone the event, it is astonishing that they did not consider including a female identifying artist – the bare minimum – to their list of 21 glitch artists.

Nevertheless, when the glitch artists showed solidarity regarding the lack of representation that caused the auction house to change its mind, it sets the right example for all other industries, not just art.

But despite the performative “Women’s Day celebration”, it seems that much more needs to be done.

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