Influential Space Gallery Houses the First Israeli NFT
In recent news, Influential Space, has now formally transitioned into the first NFT gallery in the State of Israel. It was inaugurated in the month of April and was the first NFT gallery in the Middle East to turn into a virtual art world from a physical one. The co-founder of the website, Tlalit Prescher, expressed her happiness at the transition. She added that this particular NFT space will further facilitate buyers and sellers and allow it to become more prominent in the country. In her words, the mission of the gallery is to promote the digital works of various new and renowned artists, while having an impact on the way people invest in or experience NFT art.
NFTs, or rather, non-fungible tokens are unique digital assets that range from images to animations, to songs and videos. These have been certified in one-of-a-kind cryptocurrency blockchains and smart contracts, usually Ethereum. Unlike a shekel or a dollar bill, an NFT is non-fungible and cannot be exchanged with another item which is identical. Just recently, the NFT market garnered a lot of hype and exceeded an amount equivalent to $40 billion in the previous year. This means that around $40 billion was spent in 2021 on digital collector items, such as traditional art.
Artists are swiftly being pulled in towards this novel realm due to the agency that comes with these NFTs, in the movements and sale of their works. Various speculative buyers are also setting foot into the NFT space, hoping to acquire assets that will rise in value over time. On the other hand, there are several skeptical people who have chosen to dismiss NFTs on the basis of these begin a bubble or a fad that will either burst or fade. Moreover, David Hockney, a British painter, is known to have dubbed the NFTs with another acronym, namely ICS. According to him, it is defined as the ‘International Crooks and Swindlers’. To this day, he is known for selling the most expensive painting.
Where the Jewish state is concerned, it has not stepped back from the emerging market. Back in July of 2021, the first national legislature was released by the Knesset to partake in the NFT market. This happened shortly after a signed oath from Chaim Herzog, the former President of Israel, surfaced in the form of an encrypted digital copy. The oath consisted of the leader handing his office to Isaac Herzog, his son, a couple of days before the presidential inauguration took place. As of now, Shenkar College, the Ramat Gan-based institute, has taken the reigns of the NFT culture and art innovations.
In the upcoming two weeks, Shenkar has announced that it will be playing host to the second yearly NFT conference. The aim of the conference is to focus on the primary benefits and applications of the NFT technology, such as community art, copyrights, start-ups, and others. The President of Shenkar, Sheizaf Rafaeli, has further revealed that he is expecting more than a thousand people to attend the NFT conference. These will include artists, students, investors, music producers, as well as government personnel.
