“Flipping copyright on its head: artists at the service of the art”

As an artist and legal scholar, Primavera De Filippi has been researching ways to investigate the challenges of copyright in the digital realm, both academically and artistically for many years. In 2013, she went to Harvard University to investigate the legal challenges of digital technology, with a specific focus on peer-to-peer technologies and decentralized networks. In this context, she was initially fascinated by Bitcoin During her fellowship at Harvard, she decided that Ethereum would become the core focus of her research, and in particular the legal challenges and opportunities raised by smart contracts, DAOS and blockchain technology more generally.

MediumAnna SeamanMay 21, 2024Art Dubai, art, copyright, NFTsComment

Digital patterns in architecture depicting the post-future

Kevin McCoy’s Quantum is widely credited as being the first NFT. It appears as an octagonal aura, floating on a black background with color pulsating from its core. Kevin McCoy has described the work as his interpretation of the moment of creation. Minted on the Namecoin blockchain in 2014, and later on Ethereum, after which it sold at Sotheby’s Natively Digital sale for $1.4 million, Quantum is now iconic, standing as it does at the first intersection of the blockchain and art.

MediumAnna SeamanMay 17, 2024Art Dubai, art, NFTsComment

“Value and art — a specular relation”

It was a play on words that sat atop another play on words. When Sarah Meyohas envisioned Bitchcoin (2014) and launched the project in January 2015 as a physically-backed asset on a fork of Bitcoin, she was fusing art and tech with a clever metaphor. Bitchcoin was a spin off from Bitcoin, itself a name that references the financial worlds of gold, mining and speculation but Meyohas added another layer — gender.

Medium, FeaturesAnna SeamanMay 15, 2024art, Art Dubai, currency, cryptocurrencyComment

“I don’t like mixing art and money”

Colborn Bell is an intriguing sum of many parts. Perhaps best known in the crypto space for the Museum of Crypto Art (MOCA), which he founded in 2020 and to which he donated 150 of his personal collection of 1/1 NFT artworks, he is a former financier, self-declared outsider and an artist who values, above all, stories, connections and conversations.

MediumAnna SeamanApril 27, 2024Cryptocurrency, art, museums, NFTComment

“All of my buildings are inside out”

Architectural design in ‘real life’ can require 100s of iterations prior to deciding the final structure. The resulting architecture must make sense logistically, fit the allocated budget and is obviously bound by physics and gravity. However, when Kirk Finkel practised as an architect, he always felt the unrealised imaginings were the most exciting, where the most stakeholders were engaged and creativity flourished; tossing them aside was to sacrifice artistry for practicality.

MediumAnna SeamanApril 25, 2024art, crypto, NFT, MetaverseComment

The Great Leveller

Not wanting to sound too morbid at the beginning of a new year but the words that I have chosen for the title of this piece, in literary terms, usually signify death and how the fall of the final curtain makes no distinction between rich or poor, status or insignificance. Death, indeed, is the greatest leveller of all. However, these words continually come to my mind when pondering the world of NFTs and how they are impacting the traditional art market.

FeaturesAnna SeamanApril 19, 2024art, crypto, NFTComment

To NFT or not to NFT

Since the historic Christie’s and Beeple drop in March, the three letters N, F and T have morphed into one of the world’s most talked about acronyms. They carry with them a sense of mystery as well as an air of confidence for those in the know. Use the acronym boldly in conversation and you tell your friends, that yes indeed, you know exactly what an NFT is. But, let’s be honest, six months ago (or maybe more for a select few), had you even heard of the word fungible?

MediumAnna SeamanApril 15, 2024Metaverse, art, curator, languageComment

The Journeyman

Over the centuries, many feet have traversed the desert sands of the Arabian Peninsula. Some seeking sustenance, some seeking shelter and others seeking inspiration. Although the musings of these wanderers were mostly charted in poems passed down orally, their footprints have left an imprint of collective memory upon the modern Arab world.

Profiles, FeaturesAnna SeamanApril 11, 2024Abdullah Al Saadi, Tarek Abou El Fetouh, The Bienale Arte 2024, artComment

33 Songs, 99 Words

Sawsan Al Bahar’s father raised her with music. “There was never a moment without music playing in our house. I grew up listening to a rich spectrum: songs by superstars and obscure musicians, songs known to all and songs known to nobody,” she says. But it was songs by Arab music’s pioneers that captured her heart. Richly lyrical numbers taught her—yearning, nostalgia, love, joy, pride, protest, celebration, mourning, and humour. Now the Damascus-born, Dubai-based artist presents an exhibition at Maraya Art Centre in Sharjah, which charts her life through 33 songs, a track for each year.

Profiles, FeaturesAnna SeamanSeptember 27, 2023art, music, Sawsan Al BaharComment

Enter the Digital Era, How NFTs are Impacting Art, Creativity and Beyond

In 2021, Collins Dictionary announced that NFT was word of the year, which was a rather curious situation for a word that isn’t even a word. NFT is an acronym that stands for non-fungible token. Collins defines it as “a unique digital certificate, registered in a blockchain, that is used to record ownership of an asset such as an artwork or a collectible.” The rise of NFTs in popular discourse over the course of the past 12 months has been meteoric and frankly unprecedented especially given that the vast percentage of people had never heard of one before March 2021. This month two things happened to catapult them into the headlines. First was Twitter’s co-founder Jack Dorsey selling the first ever tweet as an NFT for USD 2.9 million and the second was the sale of an artwork by a previously unknown artist called Beeple whose digital collage sold at Christie’s for USD 69 million. Of course, this was not the birth of NFTs. Actually, the first ever piece of art minted [this is the term for making an NFT] on a blockchain was in 2014 but March 2021 will go down in history as a watershed moment.

FeaturesAnna SeamanNovember 8, 2022NFTs, Metaverse, art, digital art, Technology

Extended spotlight series

Get acquainted further with the artists in Leila Heller Gallery’s stable. Go exploring their artist spotlight posts.

Isolation life: 5 online art shows worth checking out

Don’t let isolation get you down. Here is a round up of five digital art displays, showcasing art from across the region to brighten up your day and provide some much needed cultural impetus.

Elif Shafak to speak at exhibition of Middle Eastern art

I AM is an exhibition that focuses on art by Middle Eastern women. Turkish author Elif Shafak will be speaking at the event on August 14, 2017

NewsAnna SeamanAugust 2, 2017Elif Shafak, Janet Rady, I AM, art

eL Seed unveils a new wall mural in Ajman, UAE

Using freehand strokes of spray paint, eL Seed paints buildings all over the world with poignant messages and in an instantly recognisable style. His latest project is in Ajman, UAE

News, Most PopularAnna SeamanJuly 10, 2017eL Seed, Ajman, Sharjah, calligraffiti, Arabic, jederiya, art